Danish party urges minister to challenge EU wolf protections

Danmarksdemokraterne is calling on Denmark’s minister for nature and animal welfare to work to change EU rules protecting wolves after one followed a runner and showed its teeth in northern Jutland, DR reported.

Kim Edberg Andersen, the party’s animal welfare spokesperson, said Denmark was fundamentally too small for wolves and that their numbers therefore needed to be regulated.

The incident took place on Friday at Bunken Klitplantage, a forest plantation in northern Jutland. Two wolf experts said the wolf was protecting a young and had no intention of attacking the runner.

Even so, Andersen said the incident was extremely unsettling and called on Minister Christian Raabjerg Madsen to travel to the EU and prepare a change to the Habitats Directive. The directive protects endangered species to safeguard biodiversity, meaning Denmark cannot simply regulate the wolf population by, for example, shooting wolves.

Andersen said he supported having wild wolves in nature but argued that the geography of Jutland could not accommodate them. He acknowledged that the runner did not appear to have been in danger, but said the situation could quickly become difficult if a young person froze or if someone approached a wolf with a dog.

The Danish Agency for Green Land Transformation and Water Environment has advised people not to visit the area until the situation has been assessed further.

Asked whether people should learn to live with wolves, which were originally present in Denmark, Andersen rejected the suggestion as whataboutism. He said residents were already being forced to fence in animals and children, and were now also being told not to use nature.

Raabjerg Madsen said the rules were clear and that Denmark could not currently eradicate wolves. He said he would work to ensure the best possible coexistence with wolves, adding that incidents were taken very seriously and that the government would do what it could to prevent them from recurring and protect livestock.

The minister said it was completely unrealistic to promise Danes a future without wolves in Denmark, and that such a policy would conflict with the rules in force.