Malta 2014

Yearbook 2014

Malta. According to Countryaah.com, Malta population in 2020 is estimated at 441,554. Malta was planning to start offering a limited number of Maltese passports to people unrelated to Malta who were willing to pay. However, the passport, which according to the plans would give the holders the right to settle and work throughout the EU, got the thumbs down from both the opposition and the EU. Malta was forced to back down and the government decided that non-Europeans who want to obtain a Maltese passport must have lived in the country for at least one year. According to Abbreviation Finder, MT stands for Malta in English. Click to see other meanings of this 2-letter acronym.

The annual hunt for trip pigeons and quail caused riots between hunters and bird activists. The hunt, which takes place during Easter, has been banned by the EU, but every year a thousand hunters receive special permits to shoot 5,000 quail and 11,000 turtle pigeons, whose population has fallen by 95% since 1970. During the year, 44,000 Maltese wrote on a protest list in hope to stop the hunt, however, carried out. The Social Democratic Labor Party received 53% of the vote in the European elections on 25 May. The Nationalist Party got about 40% of the vote. During the fall, several accidents involving refugee boats on their way to Malta, which resulted in hundreds of people drowned in the Mediterranean. Among other things, between 50 and 100 children were killed when an overloaded boat on its way from Egypt to Malta was hit in September. Another 200 people drowned when another ship sank off Libya. According to topb2bwebsites, the Maltese military rescued 75 migrants from the ocean in October after their boat capsized in severe weather.