An association had denounced the “lethal controls” authorized by various CCAAs using an additional provision of an order
The Contentious-Administrative Chamber of the National Court (AN) has refused to suspend in a precautionary manner the extraction and capture of wolves in Spain by the autonomous communities by not appreciating “damage that is difficult or impossible to repair” in this measure.
In an order dated November 25, to which Europa Press has had access, the magistrates of the First Section rule out provisionally suspending the execution of the first additional provision of the Ministry’s order for the Ecological Transition that included the wolf from the northern area of the Duero in the list of wild species under special protection regime and prohibited its sport hunting.
Despite the aforementioned ban on hunting the animal, this additional provision established that they could “apply measures of extraction and capture of specimens that have an administrative authorization that is granted by the competent authority of the autonomous community as long as “it complies with a number of requirements.
That is, it collects the text, when it does not exist “other satisfactory solution” after having exhausted all preventive or livestock protection measures, as long as it is demonstrated that it would not negatively affect the favorable conservation status of the species or when the “existence of significant damage to livestock” is justified.
The Association for the Conservation and Study of the Iberian Wolf (ASCEL) requested the very precautionary suspension of the aforementioned first additional provision of the order, assuring that, as a result of it, they had been several autonomous communities that had authorized “lethal controls of the protected species”.
controls on the wolf
In this context, ASCEL assured that both the Junta de Castilla y León and the Government of Cantabria and the Principality of Asturias hadn “regulated already controls over the wolf, allowing its hunt“.
Thus, the association regretted that the execution of this provision, “which allows such lethal controls”caused a series of “damages that cannot be assessed economically, the scope and repair of which are difficult to assess and impossible to restore.”
Along these lines, ASCEL recalls that the Chamber itself already endorsed the wolf hunting ban last month by rejecting the suspension requested by Cantabria of the order of the Ministry for Ecological Transition.
Regarding the damage denounced by Ascel
Now, the National Court explains that “the damages that are difficult or impossible to repair do not emerge forcefully from the request for the measure” by the association, “because the execution of the appealed act, which allows such lethal controls, contrary to what was argued by ASCEL, would not render ineffective the possible result of the appeal filed” against the order.
“And likewise, as was already reasoned in the order that rejected the requested precautionary measure, it is clear from ASCEL’s own request document that the damage invoked is not identified with the additional provision itself, but rather with the specific administrative action, carried out by certain autonomous communities”, added the magistrates.
At this point, the Contentious Chamber explains that it is about “express administrative acts that, in addition, are liable to be appealed through ordinary mechanisms, as expressly stated in them.”
“Ultimately, and since the precautionary incident entails a judgment of limited knowledge, which prevents this Court from making any pronouncement regarding the merits of the controversy, the Chamber considers that, without the need for further consideration, it is appropriate to denyr the precautionary measure of suspension of the repeated first additional provision of the order”concludes the car.