Several dozen dolphin carcasses have been found on the beaches of the Atlantic coast on Monday, in a new massive beaching that environmental associations attribute to weather conditions and "very strong fishing pressure". On the beaches of the Ile de Ré, at least fifteen of these cetaceans have washed up over the last three days.
Étienne Caillaud, first deputy mayor of Ars-en-Ré, lamented the loss.
"We are always hurt by this kind of thing because we like dolphins, they are part of the ecosystem. They're important to us, and to see, especially since we're not the only ones obviously, there are dolphins all along the coast, and every year it's more and more worrying to see so many animals arriving dead on the coast," he said.
On Tuesday, activists from the environmental organisation Sea Shepherd on Tuesday deposited bloody dolphin corpses in front of the European Parliament in Strasbourg, in the hope that the EU will force France to stop non-selective fishing techniques.
"We come before the European Parliament because today the French state does nothing, there are no effective measures to protect dolphins. The European Commission has asked France to act, but nothing is done. We ask that Europe be more intransigent", explained Frederic Pizzol, co-head of mission at Sea Shepherd France to the media.
