Updated 12.45pm with Mediterraneo statement

Activists have called for the closure of Mediterraneo Marine Park, after three dolphins there died of lead poisoning.

Fourteen local and two international NGOs have joined forces on this issue, claiming that the Baħar iċ-Ċagħaq park has been negligent and cruel to its animals and is effectively operating an animal circus. 

The park has however pushed back against those claims, insisting all its animals are treated humanely and that dolphin activities are necessary to ensure the animals can be properly monitored for signs of ill-health. 

Malta outlawed animal circuses in 2014, but Mediterraneo is classified as a zoo, despite shows in which dolphins perform tricks for the public, Moviment Graffitti's Claria Cutajar said.  

“Dolphins are treated like circus animals,” Cutajar said at a press conference on Saturday.

Katya Borg of Animal Liberation Malta agreed.

The animals were being trained for exhibitions at paid public performances, she said, with no educational value for children. 

“What is natural about dolphins being forced on a platform for a selfie?” Borg asked. 

In 2008, the UK branch of NGO People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals had concluded that Mediterraneo was "an especially cruel park", she said, due to the small size of its pools and signs of illness and injuries on the dolphins.

Standing outside the Marsa offices of the Veterinary Regulation Directorate, the authority responsible for handing out zoo Licenses, Borg said the VRD had not taken the death of the three dolphins seriously enough, dismissing the issue as an unfortunate accident.

Dolphins dead by lead poisoning

Activists have pushed to have the park shut down since the summer, when they exposed the death of three of its dolphins. 

Bottlenose dolphins Mar, Onda and Melita died at Mediterraneo Park last year, but their deaths were never reported until activists went public with their suspicions in August.

That prompted Mediterraneo to speak up, with the park acknowledging the deaths, which it described as an "unfortunate incident" of lead poisoning caused by a weight bag that was left unattended by a support diver. 

A probe by the Veterinary Regulation Directorate also concluded that the animals had died due to accidental lead poisoning, but that investigation was called into question by the Commissioner for Animal Welfare.

Commissioner Alison Bezzina flagged multiple shortcomings in the VRD investigation. Among other things, inspectors only visited the park one month after the dolphins had died, as part of a scheduled inspection, and only sought an official statement from the park nine months after the deaths.  

Mediterraneo defends itself

Mediterraneo however argued that activists were spreading “misconceptions” about the park and its treatment of animals.

“All five dolphins at Mediterraneo Marine Park are well-fed, given top veterinary treatment and never mistreated,” it said in a statement it published on its website.

The dolphins in question had died as a result of a “pure accident” in what was a singular event in 25 years of operation, it said. Three other dolphins who had been poisoned in the incident had been nursed back to health and survived, it noted.

It said that the activities dolphins were made to do during paid exhibitions were necessary to ensure the animals’ wellbeing, as they “allow the veterinarian to check the health status of the animal.”

The park also pushed back against activists’ arguments that keeping the dolphins in captivity is inhumane, arguing that the animals in question were born in captivity and would likely not survive in the wild.

Emptying the tanks and releasing them would “condemn them to attack by other dolphins. At the very least, it would condemn them to assured solitude (being social animals), since outsiders are not welcome in dolphin groups,” it said.