Czech national park head admits applying poison at odds with law

Vimperk, South Bohemia, May 6 (CTK) - Czech Sumava National Park (NP) director Jan Strasky Friday admitted having ordered biocides to be applied against the bark-beetle calamity without gaining the required exception from law.

In a statement sent to CTK, he writes that in face of the pending new wave of the beetle population he ordered the use of all effective methods, including biocides, whose application is banned in the National Park.

Earlier Friday, Strasky sacked his deputy Tomas Hlavaty, who also holds the post of the NP's state administration section who failed to secure the exception enabling to use biocides.

"Although the proceedings [aimed to gain the exception] were not completed, I ordered the combination of all most effective methods to be applied in fighting the bark-beetle, including the use of biocides to poison bark beetle traps with," Strasky writes.

"As I took over the post of NP director [this February] in a situation where the whole NP faces a bark-beetle calamity, it is my legal duty to take all possible measures against the beetle in order to prevent damaging of state property and the property of neighbouring forests' owners," Strasky writes.

He writes biocides have been used annually and standardly in Sumava, but their use each time needs an exception the state grants in administrative proceedings.

This year's proceedings, which started in January, have been dragging on unprecedentedly and they remained unfinished in the past week when steps against the beetle had to be taken urgently to be effective, Strasky says.

That is why he ordered biocides to be used in beetle traps to the minimal necessary extent in order to avert damaging of forests, though the administrative proceedings had not finished and the exception had not been granted.

Strasky said some 33,650 beetle traps have been installed in the Sumava nature reserve, one-fifth of which are poisoned with biocides.

"True, the applied insecticide, vaztak, is not selective and may kill other insect species as well. This usually does not happen, however, as the traps are equipped with pheromone evaporators attracting exclusively the bark-beetle," Strasky writes.

Environmentalists, however, assert that other rare species will be massively devastated along with the bark-beetle.

This was among the opinions the administrative proceedings were to either confirm or refute.

Strasky's deputy Jiri Manek told the media Friday that the poisoned traps have not been installed in the most strictly protected zones of the NP.

The situation has been checked by the Czech Environmental Inspection, which may fine the NP up to one million crowns.

The application of biocides in Sumava was criticised by the Children of Earth environmentalist group on Thursday.

The Sumava NP, spreading along the south-western border with Bavaria, is the largest of the Czech Republic's four national parks.