Another difficult start. As happened in other regions, the start of the hunting activity in Sicily was complicated from an appeal filed by Legambiente, WWF and the Italian Bird Protection League (LIPU) to the Regional Administrative Court. The judges agreed with the environmentalists, considering the illegitimate pre-opening on September 1st. For this reason, the suspension of withdrawals has been ordered until next October 1st as regards birds and small game.
Similarly, the continuation of the hunt for the month of February 2019 is not legitimate. A further provision concerns the closure of the rabbit hunt in reference to the opinion expressed by theISPRA (Higher Institute for Environmental Protection and Research).
Here is how the three environmental associations commented on the sentence: "The TAR Palermo, in recalling the jurisprudence of Council of State on compliance with the opinion of ISPRA and for the first time also that of Court of Auditors on the tax damage resulting from the illegal hunting of wild fauna (unavailable state heritage), highlighted the lack of updated scientific data on the basis of which the Region should have regulated hunting in Sicily". The request to the local authority is to execute the decision of the Regional Administrative Court.