Category: Asia

Thailand re-examines tiger sale

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, January/February 2007:

BANGKOK–The Thai National Counter Corruption Commission is
reportedly re-investigating the long controversial export in 2002 of
100 tigers from the Sri Racha Tiger Zoo in Chon Buri to a privately
owned zoo or tiger farm, depending on definitions, in Hainan,
China.
“Ex-forest department chief Plodprasop Suraswadi allegedly
delivered those tigers to China without approval from the National
Wildlife Protection Committee,” wrote Apinya Wipatayotin of the
Bangkok Post. “The Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment
once set up a probe panel to look into the case. The committee later
concluded Plodprasop did not commit any offence,” but observers were
less convinced.

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First Beijing dog purge in five years brings unprecedented rally

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 2006:
BEIJING–Either “The Year of the Dog” ended in Beijing with
the first major dog purge in the city since March 2001, or with the
introduction of world-standard animal sheltering and adoption
practices, depending on whether one asks activists or officials.
Possibly a bit of both happened.
The few certainties are that the dog laws enforced in
November 2006 by the Beijing Public Security Bureau, Agriculture
Bureau, and Administration for Industry & Commerce were of dubious
value in ensuring public safety; that the crackdown was openly
motivated by concern for keeping the streets clean and safe before
the 2008 Olympics; and that the outcome may have been “killing the
dog to scare the monkey,” as animal advocates gathered on November
11 outside the Beijing Zoo in a globally reported protest.

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Olympics to showcase growing Chinese animal testing industry

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, December 2006:
BEIJING–The 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing will showcase the
fast-growing Chinese animal testing industry, the official Xinhua
news agency disclosed on November 15.
“All food and ingredients to be prepared in Olympic kitchens
will be fed to white mice a day before they are served to athletes,”
explained Beijing Municipal Health Inspection Bureau representative
Zhao Xinsheng.
Translated the BBC, “The mice will be fed milk, alcohol,
salad, rice, oil and seasonings. Mice show adverse reactions [to
common forms of food poisoning] within 17 hours, while laboratory
tests take much longer,” Zhao Xinsheng said.
The Olympic connection surfaced amid publication of frequent feature
articles about animal testing in China by Beijing-based business
writer Jehangir S. Pocha.

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World Wildlife Fund chopper crash kills 24

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2006:
KATMANDU, Nepal–A helicopter chartered by the World
Wildlife Fund crashed on September 23 near Gunsa, 250 kilometers
east of Katmandu, the Nepalese capital, killing all 24 people
aboard.
The flight was transporting officials to a ceremony at which
management of the Kanchenjuna Conservation Area Project was to be
turned over to the community. The region attracts birders trekking
to see Himalayan monal, emerald doves, and maroon orioles, among
other rare high-elevation species.

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Dogs killed on their holiday

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2006:
KATMANDU, Nepal–Street sweepers on October 20 shocked
Narayan Municipality, a suburb of Dailekh, Nepal, by poisoning 23
dogs “on the first day of Tihar and even into Kukur Tihar–the second
day of the second greatest Nepalese festival,” reported Hariharsigh
Rathour of the Katmandu Post, explaining that “On the second day of
Tihar, dogs in Nepal are adorned with flower garlands around the
neck and red tika on the forehead. They are then offered a great meal
and then ritually worshipped.”
Narayan official Nirak Rawal told Rathour that the city had
asked locals to keep dogs indoors, “But we didn’t give any order to
kill stray dogs on Kukur Tihar,” he said.

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“Year of the Dog” brings help for dogs in China–and cats

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2006:
BEIJING, SHANGHAI–“The year of the dog has been difficult
for man’s best friend,” South China Morning Post reporter Jane Cai
observed on October 26, 2006. “Tens of thousands of canines have
been culled across the nation in the past few months and more will be
clubbed to death soon by local governments fearing rabies.”
True enough, but the 2006 Year of the Dog appears also to
have been the year that purging dogs began to give way to
vaccination. All year, the Beijing-run state newspapers and news
web sites have been exposing and denouncing dog massacres, always in
the past either praised or ignored.
An October forum on humane rabies control, held in Shanghai,
drew high-profile national coverage.

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Philippine crack-down on dog meat

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2006:
Baguio City, Philippines–Embarrassed by reports that
Benguet province might attempt to repeal or circumvent enforcing the
1998 Philippine national ban on selling dog meat, officials of the
National Meat Inspection Service, Baguio police, and
representatives of the Animal Kingdom Foundation in early October
seized 104 kilos of dog meat from the public market stalls of vendors
Lita Dizon and Victorino
Montano, “who are reportedly known as dog meat vendors,” wrote Jane
Cadalig of the Baguio City Sun Star.

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Seeking to end sacrifice

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2006:
KOLKATA, CAPE TOWN, LOS ANGELES–Challenging public animal
sacrifice at the Kailghat Temple in Kolkata since 2000,
Compassionate Crusaders Trust founder Debasis Chakrabarti won a
September 15, 2006 verdict from the Calcutta High Court that the
ritual killings may no longer be conducted in open public view.
The 200-year-old Kalighat temple, beside the Hoogly River,
is among the most visited sites of sacrifice to the blood goddess
Kali. Chakrabarti previously tried to persuade devotees that
donating blood to hospital blood drives would be as acceptable to the
goddess.
Anti-sacrifice demonstrations and the blood drives helped to
reduce the numbers of sacrifices, Chakrabarti told news media.
Moving sacrifice inside the temple walls, Chakrabarti hopes, will
reinforce the message that it is not acceptable in modern India.
But the message and reality are somewhat at odds. Karnataka,
Gujarat, Orissa, Himachal, Tamil Nadu, and Andhra Pradesh states
prohibit animal sacrifice. Yet sacrifice is exempted from coverage
by the federal Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, in effect since
1960, and the Indian constitution guarantees freedom of religion.
The traditionally lesser educated castes who eat meat and
practice animal sacrifice have had a much higher birth rate in recent
decades than the traditionally better educated vegetarian castes.
Seventy years after the caste system was officially abolished, caste
lines have blurred to the point that lower caste origins are no
longer an obstacle to winning economic and political success, and in
some districts are even an advantage. Vegetarianism is still widely
professed, but the population balance in India has shifted in the
space of a generation from approximately half to less than a third
actually not eating meat.

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A field day over elephant polo

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, November 2006:
JAIPUR–Elephant polo, by most witness accounts, would seem
to be among the most unlikely of sports to generate controversy. It
is slow-moving, and not televised in bar rooms. Few people watch in
person. Fewer still participate, or could afford to, at a World
Elephant Polo Association-advertised price of $6,000 per team
tournament entry, covering elephant rental, equipment use,
officiating, and insurance.
Only the participants are likely to bet on the games.
An October 2005 “international” match in Jaipur, India,
between teams of three men from the Lahore Polo Club of Pakistan and
three women from the Amby Valley of Germany, ended abruptly when an
elephant stepped on the ball. None of the “world class” players had
ever before ridden elephants.

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