The
shocking image of a dead Cinereous Vulture photographed in Lebanon and shared
on social media suggests the indiscriminate killing of birds continues to be
rampant across the country.
The
shooting of vultures, a practice once common across Europe, that contributed to
their widespread decline in the 19th and 20th centuries, is thankfully now a
rare occurrence in Europe – although still happening here and there, as we saw
with the killing of a Griffon Vulture in Montenegro recently.
The
situation is sadly not the same across much of the Middle East where the
intense killing of vultures, eagles and other birds for sport continues, as the
killing of this visiting Cinereous Vulture illustrates.
Lebanon
lies right at the heart of the Eastern Mediterranean Flyway, an important
migratory route for birds migrating between Africa and Eurasia, which sees
millions of endangered birds pass over the skies of the country, including
Egyptian Vultures as well as other raptors such as buzzards, short-toed eagles,
kites, honey buzzards and many falcons.
Widespread
illegal killing of birds has always been a problem in Lebanon, so much so that
a moratorium on hunting of birds was declared in 2004 – on paper, hunting was
illegal since then, but the killing did not abate – on the contrary. A 2015
Birdlife International study estimated that 2.6 million birds were shot down in
Lebanon each year, which per capita is the second most number of birds shot in
the Mediterranean region, after Cyprus. Hunting is considered a tradition
passed down the generations, smaller birds are usually cooked and eaten but vultures,
raptors and other larger birds are shot just for sport.
