From Mr P Gingell

Reference is made to the article entitled “Xaghra Stone Circle villa given the go-ahead” on PA 7946/05 in Xaghra (TMIS, 20 January).

MEPA feels it must clarify the impression given by the title of your story that the approved permit was actually on or at the very least abutting the Xaghra Stone Circle. As can be seen from the attached picture, easily obtainable from MEPA website, the site is not even within or in close proximity to the buffer zone for the archaeological remains.

Quite correctly, the article pointed out that the Cultural Heritage Advisory Committee received no objections, but the monitoring condition was to be included and was to be executed by the Superintendence of Cultural Heritage.

Again, proper research, or even a query to MEPA would have elicited the fact that the Superintendence sits on the Cultural Heritage Advisory Committee following an agreement with MEPA.

This letter is being sent to remove any misconceptions that could possibly have been created through an unhappy choice of headline.

Peter Gingell

Marketing Executive

Malta Environment and Planning Authority

Editor’s note: This is precisely what we did. We clicked on the site as found on the MEPA website and clicked on the admittedly very narrow band of land on the right-hand side of the site. The MEPA website itself shows, when you double-click, that this is within the buffer zone.

In other words: MEPA’s map server shows the back of the site in question falling within the stipulated buffer zone, with both the boundary markings and the pop-up information window confirming as much.

According to MEPA’s information, the area is within the buffer zone and is of Type AAI (Area of Archaeological Importance).

DPA of June 2007 report notes that the Gozo and Comino Local Plan Map 14.12-A “designates the site as within the residential area with the back of the site falling within an area designated as an Archaeological Park”.