Farther Away: Essays by Jonathan Franzen Page A

Nationalists can afford to alienate their hunting constituents so much that they stay away from the polls. Enforcement of hunting laws therefore continues to be lax: minimal manpower is devoted to it, many local police are friendly with hunters, and even the good police can be lethargic in responding to complaints. Even when offenders are prosecuted, Maltese courts have been reluctant to fine them more than a few hundred euros.
    This year, the Nationalist government opened the country’s spring season on quail and turtledove in defiance of a European Court of Justice ruling last fall. The EU Birds Directive permits member states to apply “derogations” and allow the killing of small numbers of protected species for “judicious use,” such as control of bird flocks around airports, or subsistence hunting by traditional rural communities. The Maltese government had sought a derogation for continuing the “tradition” of spring hunting, which the directive normally forbids, and the Court had ruled that Malta’s proposal failed three of four tests provided by the directive: strict enforcement, small numbers, and parity with other EU member states. Regarding the fourth test, however—whether an “alternative” exists—Malta presented evidence, in the form of bag counts, that autumn hunting of quail and turtledove was not a satisfactory alternative to spring hunting. Although the government was aware that the bag counts were unreliable (the FKNK’s general secretary himself once publicly admitted that the actual bag might be ten times higher than the reported count), the European Commission has a policy of trusting the data presented by the governments of member states. Malta further argued that, because quail and turtledove aren’t globally threatened species (they’re still plentiful in Asia), they didn’t merit absolute protection, and the commission’s lawyers failed to point out that what counted was the species’ status within the EU, where, in fact, their populations are in serious decline. The Court therefore, while ruling against Malta and forbidding a spring hunt, did allow that it had passed one of the four tests. And the government, at home, proclaimed a “victory” and proceeded, in early April, to authorize a hunt.
    I joined Tolga Temuge, a ponytailed man who likes to swear, on an early-morning patrol on the first day of the season. We weren’t expecting to see much shooting, because the FKNK, angered by the government’s terms—the season would last only six half-days, instead of the traditional six to eight weeks, and only 2,500 licenses would be granted—had organized a boycott of the season, threatening to “name and shame” any hunter who applied for a license. “The European Commission failed, ” Temuge said as we drove the dark, dusty labyrinth of Malta’s road system. “The European hunting organization and BirdLife International did a lot of hard work to arrive at sustainable hunting limits, and then Malta joins the EU, as the smallest member state, and threatens to bring down the whole edifice of the excellent Birds Directive. Malta’s disregard for it is setting a bad precedent for other member states, especially in the Mediterranean, to behave the same way.”
    When the sky lightened, we stopped in a rough limestone lane, amid walled fields of golden hay, and listened for gunshots. I heard dogs barking, a cock crowing, trucks shifting gears, and, somewhere nearby, electronic quailsong playing. Patrolling elsewhere on the island were six other of Temuge’s teams, staffed mainly by foreign volunteers, with a few hired Maltese security men. As the sun came up, we began to hear distant gunshots, but not many; the country seemed essentially bird-free that morning. We proceeded through a village in which a couple of shots rang out—“Fucking unbelievable!” Temuge cried.