Hotel project on hold.

Spanish hotel chain Grupo Pinero has put the construction of its new Bahia Principe Bayahibe on hold after receiving a notification from the Ministry of Environment, reports Diario Libre (June 5, 2007):

The Ministry objected to the hotel's construction in the National Park of the East. The company Inversiones Coconut S.A. had received a certificate of no-objection fromthe Ministry of Tourism for the construction on Jan. 10, 2006. Environmentalist Eleuterio Martinez cited multiple environmental violations by Bahia Principe hotels in the country. These include the first Bahia Principe San Juan in Maria Trinidad Sanchez province on the north coast, which was built in a mangrove area, with more rooms than the authorized limit for the zone and within the 60-meter coastal limit;

Groups in Samana have criticized the chain's privatization of beaches and the company's failure to present environmental permits for the expansion undertaken at the Cayo Levantado hotel. The Coalition for the Defense of Protected areas has criticized the Ministry of Tourism for granting the no-objection permit for the hotel's construction in the National Park of the East.