A slew of victories against badger digging: Bern’s reason for rejecting 10 NGOs’ complaints...

To condemn additional hunting periods for underground badger hunting in France, One Voice and its nine partners, animal and wildlife welfare associations, filed a complaint before the Bern Convention Committee on 15 May 2023 for the second World Badger Day. After five months of waiting, under the pretext of periods for underground hunting with hounds being in decline due to the numerous local victories obtained since 2020 before administrative tribunals, the Committee’s Bureau has decided to reject our complaint without consulting the studies that were mentioned.
We regret this (lack of) decision that is unambitious and purely diplomatic. As a consequence, we will now be going back to the Minister for the Ecological Transition, Christophe Béchu, in order to obtain strong political action from his side against the cruelty inherent to this practice of underground hunting with hounds and in line with the positive case law gathered in recent years in favour of badgers.