Chicago foie gras ban a year later

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2007:

CHICAGO–Responding to a complaint that Cyrano’s Bistrot,
Wine Bar, & Cabaret was illegally selling foie gras, the Chicago
Department of Public Health on September 5, 2007 closed the upscale
restaurant after finding a cockroach-infested kitchen –but no foie
gras.
The raid indicated that the Chicago ban on selling foie gras
appears to be holding, a year after the city council approved it
48-1, and that Department of Public Health spokes-person Tim Haddac
erred two weeks earlier when he alleged to Chicago Tribune restaurant
critic Phil Vettel that “Every hour we spend on foie gras is an hour
we don’t spend protecting people against food-borne illnesses.”
Vettel reported on the August 22, 2007 first anniversary of
the passage of the foie gras ban that, “Aficionados can still dine
on foie gras, if they know where to look.”

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American Veal Association votes to phase out crating

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2007:

WASHINGTON D.C.–With U.S. veal consumption now less than
half of what it was in 1980, a third of what it was in 1970, a
fifth of what it was in 1960, and a sixth of the peak circa 1950,
the American Veal Association board of directors on May 9, 2007
voted unanimously to phase out crating calves by 2017–but their
decision did not reach the public until the Humane Society of the
U.S. and PETA claimed victory in early August 2007 press releases,
while urging faster action.
The American Veal Association resolution mentioned that
“industry must always be aware and mindful of consumer concerns,”
and that “group housing was imposed legislatively” in Europe in the
mid-1990s.
Introduced to the U.S. from the Netherlands soon after World
War II, veal crating was almost immediately criticized as inhumane
by both animal advocates and farmers using traditional woodlot
pasturing and group housing to fatten calves for early slaughter.
Intensive campaigning against veal crating, however, was introduced
by the Farm Animal Reform Movement and the Humane Farming Association
in the mid-1980s. FARM has organized annual Mother’s Day protests
against veal crating for more than 20 years, while HFA has placed
versions of ads similar to the one on page 5 of this edition of
ANIMAL PEOPLE in national news magazines during the holiday seasons
that mark the traditional peaks of veal consumption.

Fungus in feed kills thousands of Saudi camels

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2007:

RIYADH–Contaminated feed is suspected of killing more than
5,000 of Saudi Arabia’s 862,000 domestic camels in less than a month
from mid-August to mid-September 2007, along with hundreds of sheep
and cattle. The deaths have occurred across most of the southern
half of the country, from Mecca to the Yemen border.
Demand for camel meat fell steeply, the Saudi online
newspaper Arab News reported. Driving the decline was concern that
the toxin might be passed from camel to human, amid rumors of camel
breeders selling sick animals for any price they could get.
A probable effect of a decline in Saudi camel slaughter would be an
increase in slaughter of imported cattle, sheep, and goats, but
since camels are usually not slaughtered if they can work, the net
effect on live transport of other species would be slight.
The camel deaths may have caused more political unrest than
economic impact.
“Breeders are venting their anger at government officials,”
Agence France-Presse reported. The daily newspaper Al-Watan quoted
a camel breeder who alleged that “officials of the Agriculture
Ministry have remained with arms folded despite this unprecedented
disaster,” which other media have described as a “national tragedy.”
“Many owners have attributed the deaths to the bran fed to
the animals recently instead of barley, whose price has been
spiraling,” said Agence France-Presse.

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Camel jockey civil rights case refiled in Kentucky after Florida dismissal

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2007:
LEXINGTON, Ky.–Plaintiffs including the parents of five
unnamed boys who were allegedly enslaved in Dubai as camel jockeys
filed a class action lawsuit during the second week of September 2007
against Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid al Maktoum, brother of the ruler of
Dubai.
The ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bid Rashid al Maktoum, was in
Lexington, Kentucky, to attend the annual Keeneland September
Yearling Sale, where the family has reportedly paid as much as $3
million for highly regarded thoroughbred horses.
The lawsuit alleges that Sheikh Hamdan was complicit in
enslaving as many as 30,000 children during the past 30 years for use
as camel jockeys–a misnomer, since the children, sometimes as
young as four years of age, are tied to the backs of the racing
camels, and have no ability to control them. Many are thrown and
injured, or even killed.

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Animals Australia seeks to bring livestock transporters to justice

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2007:

MELBOURNE, SYDNEY–Ob-taining Australian Quarantine &
Inspection Service reports on five 2006 shipments of live sheep and
cattle to the Middle East through the national Freedom of Information
Act, Animals Australia on August 22 charged two shippers with
violating the Western Australia Animal Welfare Act.
Animals Australia executive director Glynis Oogjes warned
that live exports from Tasmania might “be a potential breach of the
Tasmanian Animal Welfare Act,” and asked the Australian Government
to prosecute live exporters for “numerous examples of breaches of the
Australian Standards for the Export of Livestock,” documented by the
AQIS reports.
“We provided the material to the Melbourne Age, and it is in
the paper,” Oogjes e-mailed to ANIMAL PEOPLE. “Full details of the
high mortality shipments are now available on the Animals Australia
website,” Oogjes added.
“The AQIS reports on the two worst incidents–the deaths of
1,683 sheep during a shipment from Tasmania to the Middle East in
February 2006, and 247 cattle enroute to the Middle East in October
2006–reveal non-compliance with live export standards,” Oogjes
alleged.

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Letters [Sep 2007]

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2007:
Trying to stop net-&-bolt deer killing

About a year ago, I became informed about net-and-bolt deer
killing, which is now going on in several cities here in New Jersey,
and is extensively practiced around the U.S.
In net-and-bolt deer culls, deer are baited and trapped in
nets (usually more than one at a time), and held to await execution
by an “authorized agent,” who usually has no veterinary experience
or other experience in killing animals with minimal pain and
distress. The deer are killed by firing a steel bolt into their
heads.
Killing hooved animals with a captive bolt gun is approved by
the American Veterinary Medical Association for use in
slaughterhouses and other situations in which the bolting can be done
quickly and accurately, with minimal awareness by the victim animal
that something bad is about to happen. However, netting and bolting
deer causes great pain and distress. The deer often do not die
instantly. Instead, they may receive several boltings before death,
because in order to cause instant death, the bolt must hit a certain
part of the brain. This is almost impossible because the netted deer
are flailing and throwing themselves around, making it impossible to
target one particular spot, which is much smaller for a deer than
for cattle, pigs, horses, and sheep, the species for whom the
AVMA recommendation was developed. Netted and bolted deer suffer a
slow, excruciating death, not to mention broken limbs resulting
from their struggles to escape from the nets.
Several of us are banding together to fight this, but we
need more support, more help. Please, if there is anything that
you can do, contact me.
–Jessica Ross
Princeton, N.J.
<ross.jessie@gmail.com>
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Supreme Court of India upholds bullfight ban

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2007:

NEW DELHI–A three-judge bench of the Supreme Court of India
on July 27, 2007 overturned a March 9, 2007 Madras High Court
judgment dismissing a petition seeking enforcement of the Prevention
of Cruelty to Animals Act to prohibit harvest festival bullfights and
bullock cart races.
Called jallikattu, the bullfights and bullock cart races as
practiced mostly in rural Tamil Nadu somewhat resemble the mob
attacks on bulls practiced at festivals in parts of Spain, Latin
America, and South Africa.
Participants beat the bulls and throw chili powder in their
eyes, ears and mouths to enrage them, Animal Welfare Board of India
witnesses testified. Spectators and participants are often gored or
trampled to death, “and the number of injured fighters has often run
into the hundreds,” noted Reuters.

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Dogs symbolize the west in Iran

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2007:

TEHRAN–Radio Free Europe on September 14, 2007 amplified
and elaborated upon accounts circulating for more than six weeks that
Iran has embarked upon an intensified campaign of harassment against
dog keepers.
“Since the creation of the Islamic republic in Iran in 1979,”
Radio Free Europe said, “the acceptability of dog ownership has been
debated by the authorities. Friday prayer leader Hojatoleslam
Gholamreza Hassani, known for his hard-line stances, was quoted a
few years ago as saying that all dog owners and their dogs should be
arrested.
“In the past,” Radio Free Europe recounted, “dog owners
have received warnings or were forced to pay fines for having a pet
dog. Despite such harassment, dog ownership has increased,
especially among young people in Tehran.

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Norwegian whaler scuttled at dock

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2007:
OSLO–Sabotage was suspected in the August 30, 2007 dockside
sinking of the whaling vessel Willassen Senior in the northern
Norwegian port city of Svolvaer. No injuries were reported.
“On the night of August 30th we decided to celebrate the end
of commercial whaling in Iceland by removing a large section of
cooling pipe in the engine room of the Norweigan whaler Willassen
Senior,” said an anonymous e-mail forwarded on September 11, 2007
from Norwegian activist Daniel Rolke to Dolphin Project founder Ric
O’Barry, who shared it with ANIMAL PEOPLE.
The e-mail was signed “Agenda 21,” the name of a United
Nations Environmental Program protocol.
“This is the fifth Norwegian whaler that has come under
attack for illegal whaling activities since 1992,” e-mailed Sea
Shepherd Conservation Society founder Paul Watson from Friday Harbor,
Washington. “The others were the Nybraena, scuttled at dockside in
December 1992; the Senet, scuttled at dockside in January 1994;
the Elin-Toril, severely damaged in 1997; and the Morild, sunk in
1998.”
All were refloated and repaired.

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