Madame Roselyne BACHELOT-NARQUIN

Ministre de l'Ecologie et du Développement Durable

et

Mme Margot Wallström

EU Commissioner for the Environment

Dear Mme le Ministre,

Dear Mrs Wallstrom,

Between 30th April and 4^th May 2003 a so-called "rave party" took place, with the authorisation of the responsible Interior Minister Nicolas Sarkozy, in a nature reserve in the Champagne-Ardenne region. The ravages caused by the last such event in 2001 are still visible. This years mass event with 40,000 participants in the middle of the breeding period has caused yet more incalculable damage

With 110 bird species the reserves avifauna is unusually abundant as there is usually no human disturbance. The species most affected by the mass event are ground breeders such as Stone Curlew, Whinchat, Meadow Pipit, Corn Bunting etc., the nests of which were simply trampled; but also birds breeding in bushes and trees including Red-backed Shrike, Cuckoo, Kestrel, Long-eared Owl, Greater Spotted Woodpecker, Nightingale, Melodious Warbler, Whitethroat, Linnet, raptors such as Montagu's Harrier, Honey Buzzard, Black Kite and many others. The region is the last breeding territory of the Short-eared Owl in the Champagne-Ardenne and is home to the last remaining pairs of the once widespread Little Bustard. Such mass events also affect of course insects which are essential for the rearing of the young birds, not to mention reptiles and many species of mammals.

The vegetation (e.g. the protected orchid species) were trampled and crushed, the poor and dry soil wasenriched with human and animal excrement with catastrophic consequences for the specialised flora. The subsequent clearing and cleaning up operations only prolonged the disturbances.

This bird nature reserve is registered for the Natura 2000 protection scheme. A scheme intended to create a network of  nature reserves in Europe and connect biotopes with one another. (FFH Guideline 92/43/EWG)

It is therefore completely inexplicable how the Interior Minister as the responsible senior official especially after the experience of 2001 could authorise such a mass event in the reserve. The presence of some 40,000 people, plus their dogs, tents, camp fires and mountains of rubbish left behind is bound to overtax nature.

We urge you accordingly to ensure that French nature conservation laws are enforced and complied with. It is unacceptable for nature to be maltreated time and again just for the benefit of a small part of the population. The result can only be the destruction and impairment of the natural balance.

In the expectation that you will exercise your office in future to ensure that such potentially destructive events never again take place in such an incompatible and protected environment we remain,

Yours sincerely,

[nama and address]