A council member of the hunters’ lobby group FKNK was filmed trapping birds a day before the legal season opened.

David Briffa has been sacked from his role after he was caught by the police on Saturday in a Ħal Farruġ field. Officers confiscated his birds and nets but it is not clear what further action will be taken. The crime carries a fine of up to €5,000 and a two- to five-year hunting or trapping suspension for first-time offenders.

The police were alerted by the environmental NGO Committee Against Bird Slaughter (CABS) after it filmed Briffa in action.

Videos show Briffa laying traps in the early hours of the morning.

Another video shows him sitting in a hunter’s shelter, wearing a camouflage hat as he looks out on his setup.

Federation for Hunting & Conservation Malta (FKNK) president Lucas Micallef said Briffa has been removed from all his administrative roles in the hunters’ and trappers’ lobby group.

The group said it condemned illegal trapping. “David Briffa was suspended as soon as we heard the news and on Tuesday was officially removed during an official meeting,” Micallef said.

“He was removed as a council member and also as a member of a subcommittee he was involved in.”

A spokesperson for CABS said the case exposed the “hypocrisy” of the hunters’ lobby “whose members have no interest in science but in trapping and keeping the birds”.

It called for FKNK to exclude Briffa from the federation and make sure that he loses his hunting and trapping licences.

Briffa did not comment to Times of Malta. Questions have also been sent to the police.

The case exposed the “hypocrisy” of the hunters’ lobby “whose members have no interest in science but in trapping and keeping the birds”- CABS spokesperson

Fourteen years ago, Briffa, who was the FKNK’s assistant general secretary at the time, was fined €100 for attempted assault on CABS media officer Axel Hirschfeld and for swearing in public.

Trapping birds using cages and nets is a long established but controversial tradition in Malta.

The season for trapping seven species of songbirds opened last Sunday under what the government said were “‘strictly monitored” conditions for a study of migration movements.

The open season comes despite the Court of Justice of the European Union ruling that the country’s trapping of protected finches for “research purposes” is illegal.

The Maltese government justified opening the season by saying that the CJEU declared itself only on one point in the case about bird trapping brought against Malta – saying that the legal notice issued in the past few years to allow trapping did not include a declaration and justification that there were no satisfactory alternatives.

After studying the court’s decision, the government said it had ensured that the legal notice for the autumn “research period” included such a declaration of justification for the collection of information on songbird migration, where the trapper caught and logged information on ringed birds and released them from the same place as they were caught.

However, NGO Birdlife Malta has called on the European Commission to issue an interim measure to stop trapping of finches, saying a legal notice issued recently by the government to allow the practice was undemocratic, unethical and illegal.