The European Parliament has voted in favor of the European Commission’s proposal to weaken wolf protection, citing increased conflicts with people and livestock in some regions. The draft law, which requires approval by the EU Council, will make it easier to hunt wolves. While hunting and landowners’ associations applauded the decision, environmental groups expressed dismay. “Wolves are vital to healthy ecosystems, but today’s vote treats them as a political problem, not an ecological asset,” Ilaria Di Silvestre, director of policy and advocacy for Europe at the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), said in a statement.

The first step in the wolf’s drop in legal protection came last December, when the Standing Committee of the Bern Convention, an international treaty for the conservation of European wildlife, voted to downgrade the wolf from “strictly protected” to “protected.” The proposal was initiated by the European Commission, the EU’s executive body. Commission President Ursula von der Leyen reportedly began advocating for the downgrade after the death of her pony, Dolly, in 2022, due to a wolf attack. Subsequently, in March 2025, the Commission proposed the same protection downgrade in the EU Habitats Directive, an important EU legislation. The European Parliament, the EU’s legislative body, has now accepted amending the legislation to change the wolf’s status from “strictly protected” to “protected.” Laurens Hoedemaker, president of the European Federation for Hunting and Conservation (FACE), said in a statement: “FACE welcomes this vote, which will reduce some heavy bureaucratic and legal conflicts associated with ‘strict protection’.…This article was originally published on Mongabay