EUROPE’S most endangered seabird is under threat after a property tycoon rented a private island off Ibiza to celebrities including Justin Bieber and Cristiano Ronaldo.
elicopters ferrying A-listers to 150-acre Tagomago are disturbing species including the Balearic shearwater, considered Europe’s seabird most at risk of extinction, according to the wildlife protection organisation GEN-GOB Eivissa.
Opposition politicians in Ibiza claim local government has turned a blind eye to alleged illegal building on the islet.
Its only villa is rented out by a company controlled by the German tycoon Matthias Kuhn, a big player in the Balearic Islands property sector.
Mr Kuhn was sentenced to six months in jail in 2018 for illegal building on the islet when he expanded the villa, which Ibiza’s Mes opposition party says is an illegal construction under Spanish law because it is less than 100m from the coastline.
The sentence has not been served by Mr Kuhn and may be under appeal.
Joan Carles Palerm, of GEN-GOB, said: “On Tagomago we have constant problems with species including Eleonora’s falcon and the Balearic shearwater, a bird that only lives in our archipelago.
“As clients move by helicopter from Ibiza airport, these journeys can harm the baby falcons,” Mr Palerm told the newspaper El Diario, claiming Tagomago does not have an authorised heliport.
There are believed to be fewer than 20,000 Balearic shearwaters left in the wild, making it “critically” endangered, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature.
Tagomago is a protected space as part of the European Union’s Natura 2000 network of bird breeding sites but it is advertised on its official website as “the most exclusive private island in Europe”.
Past guests include pop stars Justin Bieber and Ronnie Wood as well as superstar footballers Gareth Bale and Cristiano Ronaldo.
Telegraph Media Group Limited [2023]