Post by Admin on Sept 1, 2005 21:48:59 GMT
New investigation reveals hanging horror in Spain
A new investigation by WSPA has exposed the way in which thousands of Spanish greyhounds (known as galgos), are hanged following the end of the hare coursing season at the start of each year.
The results of the investigation, carried out in the Castilla y Leon and Castilla la Mancha regions of Spain in March this year with the assistance of Spanish organisation Scooby (Sociedad Protectora de Animales Scooby), reveal widespread evidence that the age-old tradition of hanging dogs in Spain continues to this day. WSPA estimates that tens of thousands of galgos are being bred and killed annually in rural areas.
WSPA discovered dead dogs with nooses around their necks dumped in shallow graves or lying under trees where they had been hung and, on a rubbish tip outside the village of Rueda near Tordesillas, investigators witnessed the gruesome sight of a dead galgo hanging from a willow tree. The skeletal remains of galgos were commonplace as well as evidence of hung dogs being set on fire, with melted nooses hanging above fresh bones and ash on the ground below.
WSPA also learnt how dogs that have raced poorly are typically hung low in a slow death known as 'the piano player' due to the frantic scrabbling of their legs in a vain attempt to touch the ground. Those who have raced well are hung high, resulting in a quicker death. Unwanted galgos may also be stoned, tied up and left to starve, staked in a pond and left to drown or thrown into wells and set on fire.
Alistair Findlay, a WSPA investigator, said, "It is scandalous that Spain, a country currently holding presidency of the European Union, is allowing man's best friend to be so cruelly and callously abused in this manner. This is a graphic example of why a national animal welfare law is so desperately needed in Spain."
At present, it is not illegal to kill a dog by hanging in Andalucia and Extremadura, where there are no animal protection laws. In Castilla y Leon, a law threatening a fine of 15,000 Euros (£39,540) to anyone hanging a dog has yet to be enforced.
But there is hope. A few dogs do get spared of this cruel death and are taken to Scooby's shelter, set up in 2000. Fermin Perez is in charge and he and his team endeavour to nurse the dogs back to health, neuter them and put the dogs into a re-homing scheme; "We need more support and awareness that this is still going on and we need to stop this now." said Fermin Perez.
WSPA has written to the Spanish authorities, calling on this EU member state to finally adopt a national animal welfare law that would outlaw such cruelty.
Medina del Campo:
A four-page investigative report recently published in the Spanish magazine Interviu, confirms earlier accounts of the barbaric custom of hanging greyhounds at the end of their usefulness, either as racers or as coursing and hunting dogs.
"The greyhound who runs well dies by hanging so he will have a quick death in thanks for his service," is a common refrain among greyhound owners.
Greyhounds who don't perform well, however, suffer an agonizingly slow death: they are hung by the neck from tree limbs with their rear feet just touching the ground and die from asphyxiation when their legs tire and give out from under them. Others are hung by one leg or simply tied to a tree and left to die slowly from hunger and thirst.
Interviu reported that hundreds of greyhounds were found hanging from trees in the pine groves near this small town 100 miles northwest of Madrid in the Castile and Leon region of the country but added this practice is also common in Zamora, Andalucia and Madrid. Nearly a dozen full-color photographs by Interviu photojournalist Fernando Abizanda accompanied the text and provided uncompromisingly graphic evidence of this unspeakable inhumanity.
Several local greyhound owners vehemently denied any responsibility for the atrocities and told Interviu that outsiders were to blame. An unidentified person was quoted as saying. "When we kill our greyhounds we bury the animals...
The barbaric Spanish practice of killing unwanted greyhounds by hanging was first exposed by Madrid-based Associacion Nacional Para La Defensa De Los Animales (ANDA) last year. Photographs taken by ANDA were sent to the Brussels-based Eurogroup for Animal Welfare, who issued a press release several months ago calling for international support to stop the killings.
Source:Interviu: Loles Silva
Links for further information
www.dogs-in-spain.org/
www.greyhoundsinneed.co.uk
www.scoobymedina.com/
A new investigation by WSPA has exposed the way in which thousands of Spanish greyhounds (known as galgos), are hanged following the end of the hare coursing season at the start of each year.
The results of the investigation, carried out in the Castilla y Leon and Castilla la Mancha regions of Spain in March this year with the assistance of Spanish organisation Scooby (Sociedad Protectora de Animales Scooby), reveal widespread evidence that the age-old tradition of hanging dogs in Spain continues to this day. WSPA estimates that tens of thousands of galgos are being bred and killed annually in rural areas.
WSPA discovered dead dogs with nooses around their necks dumped in shallow graves or lying under trees where they had been hung and, on a rubbish tip outside the village of Rueda near Tordesillas, investigators witnessed the gruesome sight of a dead galgo hanging from a willow tree. The skeletal remains of galgos were commonplace as well as evidence of hung dogs being set on fire, with melted nooses hanging above fresh bones and ash on the ground below.
WSPA also learnt how dogs that have raced poorly are typically hung low in a slow death known as 'the piano player' due to the frantic scrabbling of their legs in a vain attempt to touch the ground. Those who have raced well are hung high, resulting in a quicker death. Unwanted galgos may also be stoned, tied up and left to starve, staked in a pond and left to drown or thrown into wells and set on fire.
Alistair Findlay, a WSPA investigator, said, "It is scandalous that Spain, a country currently holding presidency of the European Union, is allowing man's best friend to be so cruelly and callously abused in this manner. This is a graphic example of why a national animal welfare law is so desperately needed in Spain."
At present, it is not illegal to kill a dog by hanging in Andalucia and Extremadura, where there are no animal protection laws. In Castilla y Leon, a law threatening a fine of 15,000 Euros (£39,540) to anyone hanging a dog has yet to be enforced.
But there is hope. A few dogs do get spared of this cruel death and are taken to Scooby's shelter, set up in 2000. Fermin Perez is in charge and he and his team endeavour to nurse the dogs back to health, neuter them and put the dogs into a re-homing scheme; "We need more support and awareness that this is still going on and we need to stop this now." said Fermin Perez.
WSPA has written to the Spanish authorities, calling on this EU member state to finally adopt a national animal welfare law that would outlaw such cruelty.
Medina del Campo:
A four-page investigative report recently published in the Spanish magazine Interviu, confirms earlier accounts of the barbaric custom of hanging greyhounds at the end of their usefulness, either as racers or as coursing and hunting dogs.
"The greyhound who runs well dies by hanging so he will have a quick death in thanks for his service," is a common refrain among greyhound owners.
Greyhounds who don't perform well, however, suffer an agonizingly slow death: they are hung by the neck from tree limbs with their rear feet just touching the ground and die from asphyxiation when their legs tire and give out from under them. Others are hung by one leg or simply tied to a tree and left to die slowly from hunger and thirst.
Interviu reported that hundreds of greyhounds were found hanging from trees in the pine groves near this small town 100 miles northwest of Madrid in the Castile and Leon region of the country but added this practice is also common in Zamora, Andalucia and Madrid. Nearly a dozen full-color photographs by Interviu photojournalist Fernando Abizanda accompanied the text and provided uncompromisingly graphic evidence of this unspeakable inhumanity.
Several local greyhound owners vehemently denied any responsibility for the atrocities and told Interviu that outsiders were to blame. An unidentified person was quoted as saying. "When we kill our greyhounds we bury the animals...
The barbaric Spanish practice of killing unwanted greyhounds by hanging was first exposed by Madrid-based Associacion Nacional Para La Defensa De Los Animales (ANDA) last year. Photographs taken by ANDA were sent to the Brussels-based Eurogroup for Animal Welfare, who issued a press release several months ago calling for international support to stop the killings.
Source:Interviu: Loles Silva
Links for further information
www.dogs-in-spain.org/
www.greyhoundsinneed.co.uk
www.scoobymedina.com/
