Spanish authorities said yesterday that they will first buy then blow up a partially built hotel complex on one of the country's few unspoilt Mediterranean beaches in an effort to protect Spain's blighted coastline.
The decision to demolish the hotel at El Algarrobico beach, near Carboneras, in the south-eastern province of Almeria, was welcomed by Greenpeace and other campaigners. They had turned the complex, being built at the gateway to the Cabo de Gata natural park, into a symbol of all that has gone wrong on the saturated Spanish costas.
The Andalucian government said it would forcibly buy the half-built complex for €2.3m (£1.6m). Manuel Chaves, the president of the regional government, said yesterday: "It is going to disappear. The hotel will never be opened."
The 22-floor hotel was one of eight planned for the site, along with a golf course and 1,500 flats. Administrators sent in to run the town hall at Marbella recently announced that bulldozers would almost certainly be brought in to knock down illegal buildings there too.
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