The Committee Against Bird Slaughter (CABS) said it would return to monitor the countryside for illegal hunting and trapping.

Ten ornithologists from Germany, Italy and the UK will be here in the last week of April equipped with video cameras to record any illegal activity at important resting sites for migrating birds.

Committee president Heinz Schwarze welcomed the ban on spring hunting and said the decision was of great benefit to endangered bird species and an important signal to conservationists throughout the European Union. "It means that Malta has finally begun to treat bird protection seriously and is ready to accept and comply with international standards of conservation," he said.

Last September, the committee claimed hundreds of protected birds were being shot.

It recorded scores of cases of illegal hunting and trapping and filmed a black stork being shot down in Dwejra, the trapping of rare Ortolan buntings in Żurrieq, as well as the seizure of seven different protected species of waders in Baħrija.