Panics drive eastern European dog purges after exposés of pelt trade , From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2006

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>From ANIMAL PEOPLE, March 2006:

 

 

Panics drive eastern European dog purges after exposés of pelt trade

 

OSAKA, BUCHAREST, SOFIA--Twice in three

weeks fate linked Japan and central European

street dogs.

Because a Bulgarian circus family became

stranded in Kawachi-Nagano, Japan, Animal

Refuge Kansai on February 18, 2006 pledged to

invest the equivalent of about $85,000 U.S. in

Bulgarian dog and cat sterilization work.

Because Japanese businessman Hajime Hori, 68,

bled to death on January 29, 2006, after a dog

bit his thigh on a Bucharest street, severing

his femoral artery, Bucharest and other Romanian

cities captured and killed dogs more aggressively

in February 2006 than at any time since the 2001

street dog purge ordered by then-Bucharest mayor

Traian Basescu --who now heads the Romanian

government.

The ARK pledge to help Bulgarian

sterilization efforts came about six weeks after

Bulgarian SPCA president Yordanka Zrcheva and

Doctors for Animals spokesperson Rumi Becker

alleged to Katy Duke and Elizabeth Day of the

London Telegraph that corrupt Sofia dogcatchers

are covertly selling the pelts of up to 10,000

dogs per year.

ARK founder Elizabeth Oliver attended the

1999 International Companion Animal Welfare

Conference in Sofia, and has long felt moved to

help the animals there. The opportunity came

after she learned from an Osaka veterinarian

about a Bulgarian couple and their 21-year-old

daughter, found living in a snow-covered steel

shipping container, with their 38 trained dogs

and cats in a second container.

" Two years ago, as part of a circus

troupe, they came to Japan and performed in many

places, " Oliver said. " Their journey ended in

November 2005 when the company went bankrupt and

the owner disappeared with the proceeds. The

promotion company balked at having to pay either

their back salaries or the cost of returning

their animals to Bulgaria.

" As time passed the situation for the

animals became desperate. While the dogs could

exercise outside the container, the cats were

contained in dark cages without exercise or

sunlight. The promotion company was obviously

playing for time, " Oliver told ANIMAL PEOPLE. " I

think if we hadn't gotten the Mainichi

Broadcasting Service to feature their story on

its news channel Voice, the family would have

remained in that terrible situation until

mid-March, when their visas expired, and they

would have been forced to leave Japan without

their precious animals.

" Public response was overwhelming, "

Oliver continued. " Within a week we collected

more than enough money to cover the cost of their

return to Bulgaria. Even after we closed the

account, money came in 'for the Bulgarian

animals.' "

The Kawachi-Nagano city government and

police also took an active interest in the

situation.

" Since then, " Oliver said, " the

promotion company has paid all the costs of the

transport of the animals to Bulgaria, plus other

incidental costs like new cages. I had told the

family that we would pay all the costs, but at

the eleventh hour all this happened, so we have

been left with a sizeable amount of money. I am

determined that ARK should not receive even one

yen from this, and that the money should be

used, as intended, for the benefit of Bulgarian

animals. "

Details of the ARK investment in Bulgaria

were in planning as ANIMAL PEOPLE went to press.

 

No miracles in Romania

 

Romanian animal advocates could only wish for comparable miracles.

" Animal welfare people think the dog who attacked

the Japanese man was an owned pit bull terrier, "

as the fatal incident occurred in a neighborhood

where illegal dogfights reputedly occur, " but

most people think it was a stray dog, " Dutch

volunteer Nathalie Klinge of FPCC-Romania told

ANIMAL PEOPLE. " Mayor Adriean Videanu announced

that the city will catch all the dogs and put

them to sleep within 72 hours. Everyone who is

involved with stray dogs in Romania is working

like hell to do something about it.

" The Federatia Nationala Protectia

Animalelor, founded by FPCC and Vier Pfoten,

made a proposal to Videanu in December 2005 to

solve the stray dog problem in Bucharest through

neutering, " Klinge continued.

" Vier Pfoten had a similar agreement with

the former mayor, and spent $1 million on it, "

until Basescu " refused to cooperate any more and

started catching and killing dogs. Until now

Videanu says he hasn't made up his mind, " Klinge

said. " Meanwhile the killing goes on. "

E-mailed Bucharest art designer Violetta

Penda, " The victims are the old, the harmless,

the inoffensive, the peaceful dogs, not the

dangerous ones, because the dangerous dogs are

hard to capture. "

Videanu " doesn't know what to do or is

waiting to see which way the wind blows, " said

FPCC-Romania founder Robert Smith. " We will try

to push him to accept our proposals by placing

newspaper advertisements and by seeking

cooperation with animal control. The animal

control director, Simona Panaitescu, admitted to

me that her dog catchers are illiterate, poorly

paid, and unmotivated, and that the dog-loving

population of Bucharest hides their dogs or

bribes the catchers. She agreed they need a new

image, new personnel, and new credibility. She

said she could not return dogs to the streets,

but would not mind if we did it for her. But I

am not going to repeat my mistake in Campina, "

Smith declared, recalling his first Romanian

sterilization project, " or Vier Pfoten's mistake

in Bucharest in April 2001, when Basescu

cancelled the neuter/return program and embarked

on his useless killing campaign. We have to

control the shelters.

" Bucharest has spent over five million

euros since April 2001, and was killing on

average 1,350 dogs per month even before the

current extermination campaign, for a death toll

of about 80,000 dogs in 46 months, " Smith said,

" yet still the streets of Bucharest are full of

dogs. "

The FNPA perspective was not unanimously

accepted, even among animal advocates.

" The guilty dog has not been caught. The

assumption that it was a pit bull is hard to

sustain, " claimed SPCA Romania president Ana

Halmageanu. " All such dogs are registered with

the police, " she said, " and were the first to

be checked. It is a mongrel, " she insisted,

" previously a stray dog, who has an owner.

" The authorities no longer accept

neutering and returning dogs to the streets, "

Halmageanu continued. " For the moment, neutering

campaigns are a waste of money, as the dogs will

be captured and killed. "

Instead, Halmangeanu argued for a " general

census of dogs with owners in order to be able to

prevent and punish abandonment; mandatory

neutering of all dogs with no pedigree, down to

the last rural household; limitation of the

number of litters a bitch can produce to four in

a lifetime, only one per year; setting up as

many dog shelters as possible, having a maximum

capacity of 300 dogs; and diminishing

importation by introducing a three or six-month

quarantine, " which Halmageanu contended " would

balance demand and supply, so more dogs could be

adopted. "

Deputy mayor Razvan Murgeanu told Agence

France-Presse that the incident " shows the extent

of the stray dog problem, which we inherited

when the houses of Bucharest residents were

destroyed by the Communist dictator Nicolae

Ceausescu, forcing people to leave their dogs in

the streets. I love animals, " Murgeanu claimed.

" I have a dog myself. But the time has come to

take radical measures, however painful, and

eliminate the strays. "

An estimated 50,000 dogs remain on the

streets of Bucharest, inflicting about 6,000

bites per year, or eight a day. This is a sixth

as many dogs and 25% as many bites as were

claimed in 1996, when former actress Brigitte

Bardot funded the first high-volume sterilization

program in the city. Many are true street dogs,

with no homes or human caretakers, but half or

more live in the courtyards of particular

apartment blocks, as " community pets, " with

regular caretakers who are not allowed to take

them inside because government-owned apartment

buildings do not admit dogs.

Disillusioned by corruption and broken

promises from city hall, the Fondation Brigitte

Bardot withdrew from Bucharest in 2004. Many

other foreign organizations came and went in the

interim, finding Romania in general and

Bucharest in specific to be difficult

environments. Only Vier Pfoten, based in

Austria, is still prominent in Bucharest.

Yet the outside efforts bought time for

thousands of dogs while local groups emerged to

represent them, with increasing public support

but still little influence over official policy.

" Impounded dogs are kept without food or

veterinary care, in wet cages, in sub-freezing

weather. Volunteers are not accepted in the

pounds, " said Aura Maratas, founder of the

Fundatia Daisy Hope, one of the few private

shelters operating within inner Bucharest. " The

authorities do not want to allow animal

protection associations to assist in capturing,

feeding, sterilization, or euthanasia, even if

this is what the law recommends. "

Worst, said Maratas, " the visiting

hours are from 10:30 to 11:30 a.m., Monday

through Thursday, and on the weekends the pounds

are closed, " so that reclaiming or adopting dogs

is extremely difficult for people who hold jobs

or attend school.

" My phone is ringing all day long. People

are crying to save the dogs they have sterilized

and cared for. The dogcatchers take everything, "

Maratas finished.

" The catchers are working around the

clock, " agreed Asociatia Natura founder Carmen

Milobendzchi. " Many people are asking us to

accommodate their dogs, " at least for the

duration of the panic, " but where? We haven't

enough space. "

" At the Pallady pound an average of 50

dogs are killed daily, while only 5 are

adopted, " Sara Turetta of CaniBucharest told

ANIMAL PEOPLE. " 100 dogs per day are killed at

Chiajna, the bigger pound, on the outskirts of

Bucharest. Because Chiajna is far from downtown

and hardly reachable due to very poor streets,

fewer people go there to look for their dogs or

to adopt one. "

Turetta said she had found homes in Italy for some of the doomed dogs.

 

Gains in Galati

 

Roxana Radu of ZooTerra cited the

southeastern city of Galati as an example for

Bucharest. There, Radu said, " Vier Pfoten

Romania has sterilized 18,000 animals, with

private funds, with the cooperation of the

municipality. "

From 2002 through 2004, Vier Pfoten

Romania sterilized 10,872 dogs in Galati,

according to data Vier Pfoten gave to Robert

Smith, with no 2005 total available.

" Vier Pftoten will come again to Galati

in mid-February, " e-mailed Grigoire Corina of

the local organization Help Labus. " According to

the latest data, there are in Galati

approximately 11,200 stray dogs, 14.000 courtyard

dogs, and 3,000 living in appartments. In

total, we can talk about 28,200 dogs, one dog

to 10 citizens. "

Including suburbs which are part of the

contiguous city but beyond the city limits,

Galati has about 14,000 strays, many of them

congregating at dumps, and 16,000 courtyard

dogs, said Dana Costin, cofounder of ROLDA,

whose shelter is outside the city.

ROLDA has also sterilized hundreds of

dogs, bringing the non-reproducing part of dog

population of Galati to at least 37% and perhaps

as high as 58%, depending on the amount of

sterilization done by private individuals. Even

the high estimate would be short of the 70%

needed to bring about a population drop, but

within striking distance.

" ROLDA and [California-based partner]

Romania Animal Rescue, in collaboration with

City Hall Galati, on January 15 started a

program of free dog and cat sterilization, " wrote

Viata Libera editor Anca Spanu Tudor. " All

Galati citizens can benefit from free spay/neuter

for the cats and dogs they care for, at the

Medviovet Clinic operated by Dr. Ileana

Gheorghita. "

Visiting foreign veterinarians are expected to assist in April and May.

" Stray dogs have become a priority of

Galati mayor Dumitru Nicolae, " continued Tudor,

who said Nicolae wants to add sterilization

facilities to the two Galati shelters and expand

the shelters' combined capacity from 434 to 1,500.

The Bucharest panic spread to other

cities, especially after a young woman was

severely injured and expected to die as result of

a dog pack attack on Valentine's Day in the

village of Appraiser, near the Black Sea port of

Constantia.

" Cluj will soon be a place of dog

slaughter, " wrote Cluj resident Miron Arcas.

" There is only one animal shelter in Cluj,

consisting of 26 cells, and 800 street dogs

outside, according to the officials. There are

2,000 street dogs in the streets, according to

the Animal Protection Association. "

But in Arad, on the Hungarian border,

" things are going on as usual, " Animed Arad

founder Claudiu Iosim told ANIMAL PEOPLE. " The

dogcatchers still trap and kill stray dogs, as

they have been doing for five years now, but not

at a larger scale due to the recent events. "

Iosim said Animed Arad had sterilized 240

dogs and cats in 2005, but hoped to sterilize

500 in 2006. --Merritt Clifton

 

 

--

Kim Bartlett, Publisher of ANIMAL PEOPLE Newspaper

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