GENEVA - Spain and the European Union must halt road and dam projects that are threatening the survival of the rare Iberian lynx, the WWF environmental organisation said in a statement on Wednesday.
With only around 100 lynx left in and around Donana Natural Park in southern Spain, the animal could soon be the first big cat species to become extinct since the sabre-toothed tiger disappeared 10,000 years ago, the WWF said.
The statement from the organisation's headquarters in Switzerland said the latest surveys showed the number of lynx had declined by 60 since 2002, with only 25 breeding females left.
It said Spain was ignoring pleas from environmentalists to close a road on which many lynx had been killed and was pushing ahead with other building projects cutting through its territory.
The WWF added that while supporting projects aimed at protecting the animal, the EU was "actively contributing to the decline of the species through funding road and dam development in remaining critical lynx habitat".
The lynx was once found all over the Iberian peninsula, but numbers have declined rapidly over the past century and a half.