RE: (CN) Hu halts dog cull after reading petitions

[Guest guest]

Good news after a long time.

In any country, the court of last resort is not the

Supreme Court of that country - it is the will of the people

that counts in the final analysis.

 

The pen is mightier than the scalpel and the club, but

we must learn to wield the pen without putting up the

opponents back up against the wall.

 

Let us learn the message of this campaign - together

we can make a difference. Especially if we do not mind

who gets the credit for success.

 

S. Chinny Krishna

Blue Cross of India

 

Dr John Wedderburn [john]

Wednesday, December 13, 2006 2:12 PM

aapn

(CN) Hu halts dog cull after reading petitions

 

 

South China Morning Post

http://china.scmp.com/chitoday/ZZZMA7PVKVE.html

Wednesday, December 13, 2006

by JANE CAI

 

President Hu Jintao has intervened to end a national crackdown on

dogs after reading complaints sent to him from dog owners, sources

said yesterday.

 

One petitioner said Mr Hu's chief secretary had told her the

president had read her two petitions, signed by more than 60,000

people, calling for an end to the campaign. She said Mr Hu was

unhappy about the complaints and international media coverage of the

campaign, and had put a stop to the programme late last month.

 

A government official confirmed Mr Hu had ordered a halt after

reading the letters.

 

Tens of thousands of dogs have been culled since the eradication

campaign began in August. Authorities maintained it was necessary to

deal with a rise in the number of rabies cases.

 

In Beijing, the so-called " civilised dog keeping " campaign began in

October and was to have ended in the middle of this month. Under the

campaign, dogs taller than 35cm were prohibited from downtown areas

and each family was restricted to keeping a single pet dog.

 

Fines were introduced for owners of dogs that defecated on the street

or were found unchained. The move infuriated dog owners. About 500

staged a protest in the capital a month ago against the seizure and

killing of the pets.

 

Beijing authorities announced good results from the campaign on

Monday, saying more than 550,000 dogs had been registered and

vaccinated against rabies and progress was being made in efforts to

find new homes for more than 600 seized or abandoned dogs.

 

Yu Hongyuan , deputy director of the Beijing Public Security Bureau

(PSB), told Xinhua only 180,000 dogs had been registered in the city

in 2002.

 

But the official news agency said experts believed there were about

1 million dogs in the city, which would mean the authorities' job was

only half done.