CFFA writes to the Commissioner for Environment and Oceans, seventeen months after lodging the first complaint, and subsequent exchanges with DG Mare, as no satisfactory answer has been given.
On 6 February 2019, our organisation CFFA, as well as other environmental and professional fishing organisations, PRCM, Bloom, Danish Living Seas and CAOPA, jointly lodged a complaint to the European Commission for alleged failure by Italian authorities to adopt measures to monitor their vessels in the waters of Sierra Leone and, where relevant, to sanction them if they were operating illegally in contravention of EU fisheries rules.
Seventeen months from the complaint, and after several exchanges with the European Commission, we have not yet received a satisfactory answer by DG MARE, whose last communication was on 20 February 2020, was that it was not in a position to arrive at a decision. On 1 July 2020, CFFA sent a letter to the Commissioner for Environment and Oceans, Mr. Virginijus Sinkevi?ius, explaining the whole process, urging the Commission to act, highlighting that there are no grounds on which the Commission should delay any action that it must take, as Guardian of the Treaty, against Italy which fails to fulfil its obligations as an EU Member State and stating that if the Commission does not inform CFFA of any concrete follow-up to the complaint within one month, CFFA is ready to refer the case to the European Ombudsman.