Infrastructure Malta is to plant 61 Aleppo trees on the Saqqajja road this week, Infrastructure Minister Ian Borg said on Wednesday.
In a Facebook post, the minister said the PN has been trying to deceive and scare people by lying that trees on Saqqajja Hill would be removed.
This, he said, was never the intention.
But he pointed out that for many years, trees that died in this stretch of road were never replaced.
He said that Infrastructure Malta would remove the remains of those trees so that new Aleppo trees could replace them.
"By the end of the week, we will have 61 more Aleppo trees on Saqqajja Hill," he said.
The minister had been under attack since road works plans for the Rabat-to-Mrieħel Central Link Project and the Santa Luċija tunnels showed that score of mature trees will be uprooted.
The Central Link project, however, only reaches to the roundabout at the bottom of the tree-lined road leading to Rabat and will not affect the Saqqajja Hill stretch of road.