Poland's environment minister on Tuesday proposed an alternative route for a highway that had been planned to run through a pristine wetland, a move disputed by the EU and environmentalists.
"It appears that there is an alternative… which is less expensive and just two kilometres longer than the route originally planned through the Rospuda valley," Minister Maciej Nowicki told reporters.
A rare pristine wetland, the Rospuda valley is home to a large variety of bird species.
Nowicki said his ministry would ask the European Commission to halt legal procedures it launched against Poland aimed at halting highway construction through the Rospuda valley.
Local residents in the northeast Polish town of Augustow have been demanding a new highway in the region to ease international lorry traffic to and from nearby Lithuania on a road running through the town centre.
In 2007 construction began on a 40-kilometre-long (25 mile) stretch of the highway designed to bypass Augustow. The moved provoked strong protests from several environmental groups, among them Greenpeace.
The European Commission responded by beginning legal procedures against Poland to block construction.
The controversial stretch of highway was part of the Via Baltica, an international highway between Estonia's capital Tallinn and the Polish capital Warsaw linking all three Baltic states.
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