The European Commission insisted this Thursday that it can require Spain "if necessary" to protect the Doñana National Park and recalled that there is "solid" scientific and technical evidence on the "adverse effects" of the overexploitation of its groundwater.
"If necessary, the European Commission will have the possibility of adopting new measures to ensure that Spain complies with the judgment of the Court of Justice on Doñana," said community spokesman Tim McPhie after being asked about the Andalusian irrigation law whose processing received the green light yesterday with the votes of PP and Vox.
The European Commission already sent a letter at the end of March that gave Spain a month to adopt measures and branded the Andalusian law as a "flagrant violation" of the ruling of the Court of Justice of the EU that condemned Spain for not having done what needed to protect the wetland.
In that letter, he also threatened to bring the case before the European Justice again, this time proposing the imposition of economic sanctions for persisting in non-compliance.
The spokesman preferred not to "speculate" or enter into a "hypothesis" about the next steps taken by Brussels on this matter and recalled that a ruling by the Court of Justice of the EU (CJEU) has already condemned Spain for not protecting Doñana and that the institution opened a new file to Spain in June 2021 for not having complied with said sentence yet.
Thus, he pointed out that the Community Executive is currently "analyzing" the "observations" sent by the Spanish authorities within the framework of that file.
In this sense, the spokesman pointed out that European environmental legislation "requires the sustainable use of natural resources" and this "includes water", as well as that "the available economic activities must be compatible with the conservation of Natura 2000 areas". .
"The available scientific and technical knowledge that we have provides solid evidence on the adverse effects of the overexploitation of groundwater in the Doñana ecosystems," McPhie stressed.
