Category: Asia

Dog round-up & shark fin controversies bite Hong Kong Disneyland

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1995:

HONG KONG––Hong Kong Dis-
neyland had barely found a face-saving way to
retreat from serving sharks’ fins at weddings
when Hong Kong Dog Rescue founder Sally
Anderson complained to South China Morning
Post reporter Simon Perry that Disney man-
agement had lethally purged several dozen
dogs she was trying to capture at the theme
park and offer for adoption.
“Dozens of stray dogs adopted by
construction workers on the Disney site have
been rounded up and killed in the run-up to the
park’s opening in September,” Parry wrote on
July 25, 2005. “Forty-five dogs, some
believed to have been used as unofficial guard
dogs on the site during construction, have been
caught by government dog catchers at
Disney’s request.

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Japan still killing whales, but moratorium holds

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1995:

SEOUL––Japan is still killing minke, sei,
Bryde’s and sperm whales in the name of research,
and will kill humpbacks this year as well, with a total
self-set “scientific” quota for the year of 935.
Norway continues killing minke whales in
coastal waters, and Iceland has resumed whaling, but
all still without world approval, as the 57th annual
meeting of the International Whaling Commission ended
in Ulsan, South Korea on June 24 with no major suc-
cesses for the pro-whaling faction.
“We entered the week with a strong fear that
the balance of power within the IWC would shift to a
pro-whaling majority,” summarized Whalewatch
Coalition leader Philip Lymbery. His delegation repre-
sented the Royal SPCA, Earth Island Institute, Whale
& Dolphin Conservation Society, Whale Watch, and
Humane Society International.
“Six new pro-whaling nations joined the IWC
this year,” Lymbery continued, “countered by just
three new anti-whalers. Anti-whalers held the majority
largely due to tactical lobbying and absentees,” and
India caught up on back dues and sent a delegation just
in time for the most critical ballots.

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Most wanted poachers busted in India & Nepal

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1995:

DELHI, KASARA– – The
two most notorious living poachers on
the Asian subcontinent were arrested on
June 30 and July 20, respectively, as
result of separate investigations.
The Indian Central Bureau of
Investigation apprehended Sansar
Chand, 47, after tracing him to his
Delhi home by identifying his newspa-
per reading habits: a native of
Rajasthan, Chand read Rajasthani
papers in a neighborhood where few oth-
ers did.
First arrested for poaching and
wildlife trafficking at age 16, in 1974,
when he was found in possession of 676
animal pelts including those of tigers
and leopards, Chand worked with at
least five close relatives. He was report-
edly convicted 15 times without serving
any significant sentence, even after he
was caught with 28,486 contraband pelts
in 1988. Fifty-seven cases are pending
against him in nine Indian states, wrote
London Independent Delhi correspon-
dent Justin Huggler.

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Tsunami Memorial Animal Welfare Trust takes over in Sri Lanka

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1995:

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka– –The
Tsunami People/Animal Welfare Coalition on
July 26, 2005 wrapped up emergency relief
operations begun after the December 26, 2004
Indian Ocean Tsunami, rolling all remaining
assets over into the Tsunami Memorial Animal
Welfare Trust.
Coalition and Trust cofounder
Robert Blumberg arranged that ANIMAL
PEOPLEofficially sponsored the last of a six-
month series of vaccination missions by Pets V
Care mobile clinics into refugee camps and
tsunami-stricken coastal villages.

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Pound electrocutions stopped in Manila

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1995:

MANILA––Seeking a cheaper,
faster way to kill dogs than either lethal injec-
tion or use of an antiquated carbon monoxide
chamber, Manila Veterinary Inspection Board
members Manuel Socorro and Condenio
Panogan reportedly electrocuted approximate-
ly 100 dogs from mid-May 2005 to mid-July
before word of their work leaked out.
“Socorro “said they were given a
one-year permit by the Bureau of Animal
Industry to conduct a study of electrocution as
a tool to put down dogs,” wrote Evelyn
Macairan of The Philippine Star. “This
involved conducting a series of tests wherein
the voltage would be set starting at 100 volts
and be slowly raised to 500 volts.”

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Editorial: Compromise & the Universal Declaration on Animal Welfare

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1995:

Editorially favoring hunting, trapping, fishing, ranching, logging, rodeo, and ani-
mal use in biomedical research, the Spokane Spokesman-Review has probably never in recent
decades been mistaken for an exponent of animal rights.
Yet on September 15, 1952 the Spokesman–Review became perhaps the first and
only daily newspaper in the U.S. to editorially endorse “A Charter of Rights for Animals,”
drafted by the World Federation for the Protection of Animals.
The oldest of the three organizations whose mergers eventually produced today’s
World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSPA), the Dutch-based World Federation then
represented “humane societies in 25 countries,” the Spokesman-Review editors noted.
“Most civilized countries already have laws to cover most of the protection for ani-
mals that the federation asks,” the Spokesman-Review continued. “Beating animals, forcing
them to do work beyond their strength, transporting them in a manner to cause pain or without
adequate food, all are punishable now in the U.S., for example.”

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White tigers, green polar bears, & maintaining a world-class zoo

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1995:

SINGAPORE––When the tigers
are white and the polar bears are a blotchy
dark green, a zoo has problems.
Opened in June 1973, the
Singapore Zoo and adjacent Night Safari are
together reputedly the best zoo complex with-
in half a global orbit, together setting the
Asian zoo design and management standard.
More than 1.2 million visitors per
year view about 3,200 animals of 330 mostly
tropical species at the Singapore Zoo and
Night Safari.
The animals are chiefly housed in
semi-natural surroundings. The equatorial
Singapore climate is good for reptiles year-
round, including some of the largest tortoises,
most active monitors, and largest gharials and
salt water crocodiles on exhibit anywhere.

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Transforming Phuket animal conditions post-tsunami

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1995:

PHUKET, Thailand––Urbanization
is hitting Phuket much harder than the tsunami
of December 26, 2004.
What that may mean for animals on
the 400-square-mile resort island near the
extreme south of Thailand is anyone’s guess.
The Soi Dog Foundation and Gibbon
Rehabilitation Project, among Phuket’s most
prominent pro-animal organizations, are guard-
edly optimistic.
More development may mean more
homes for dogs and cats, and more donors to
support animal charities.

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Korean animal researcher clones human stem cells

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 1995:

SEOUL––“I never destroy any life
during my process,” Seoul National University
stem cell research laboratory director Woo Suk
Hwang recently told New York Times corre-
spondent James Brooke.
Woo Suk Hwang on May 20, 2005
announced that he had become the first scientist
to successfully clone human stem cells––“a
major leap,” wrote Brooke, “toward the dream
of growing replacement tissues for conditions
like spinal cord injuries, juvenile diabetes, and
congenital immune deficiencies.”
Said Woo Suk Hwang, “We use only
a vacant [unfertilized] egg, with no genetic
materials” from which to form an embryo.
Trained as a veterinarian, Woo Suk
Hwang, 52, was raised by a widowed mother
who supported six children as a dairy hand.
“I could communicate with cows eye
to eye,” Woo Suk Hwang told Brooke.
Woo Suk Hwang is a devout practic-
ing Buddhist, wrote Apoorva Mandavilli in a
profile for the journal Nature Medicine.
But in conversing with Brooke, Woo
Suk Hwang appeared to refer only to never
destroying any human life. His past achieve-
ments have included producing the first cow
conceived in South Korea through in vitro fer-
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