Posted on October 20, 2015 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Our recent post on this site said – “The Serbian government / Ministry are claiming that animals were NEVER exported from Serbia in the first place and that we are wrong in what we say”.
Well it would appear that upon further investigation at our request by the EU, the EU Commission has been informed by the Serbian Ministry of Agriculture that the animals did originate from Serbia; in direct opposition to what was said to us earlier.
When Serbian campaigners questioned the Ministry about this issue in the recent past they were informed that they were ‘wasting Ministry time’.
But as a result of campaigners continuous “questioning” to the Ministry on the issue; they were then threatened with closure the shelter “Alex” (for stray dogs and others) as some kind of vindictive revenge for asking normal questions about the export consignment.
Now it appears that the Serbian Ministry are telling the EU that the animals did originate in Serbia; and that they were shipped to Israel in accordance with EU Reg 1/2005 and all IATA standards. We cannot currently prove or disapprove this at the current time. Possibly all was correct in the air; but why did the Serbian Ministry deny any involvement with the export consignment ?
Yes we agree, the photos on the posts were only taken in Israel; we have never denied that and make that clear in our posts.
But this does prove that the Serbian authorities will make threats to close down animal shelters within Serbia if questions about their work is asked by welfare campaigners. Suddenly we have a letter from the EU informing us that the lambs that we were informed ‘Serbia had no dealing with’, have suddenly been ‘exported from Serbia by air in accordance with all the regulations’ – and a threat made by the Serbian authorities to close down a shelter (Alex) if we kept on ‘wasting Ministry time’ !
Here is the EU letter we have just been sent to confirm the situation:
Past links and photos:
Was our persistence a waste of time ? – we think not.
But the very worrying aspect of this is the threats made to welfare groups by the Serbian Ministry when outsiders question them or anything they do – a shelter could have now been closed and animals back on the street to be killed by shinters and authorities.
As EU citizens and investigators, Do we continue to investigate (and take the Serbian Ministry threats for shelter closure) or do we just shut up and let them continue without any programme of stray animal management – just like Romania ? – see the above link.
Crunch time folks !
Serbia – if you are going to join the EU; then clean up your animal welfare policies and enforce them; as EU welfare groups from across the continent will be hot on your heels all the time to show where you are failing – and report you as a consequence.
Filed under: CAMPAIGNS - Global Animal Welfare Issues, GENERAL NEWS - International / National / Regional, LETTERS, PHOTOGRAPHS - **WARNING** (Animal Suffering), Romania - Stray Animal Killings 2013, SERBIA (Central Serbia: Capital - Belgrade) and (Serbia, The "Serbian Animals Voice (SAV) ALLIANCE | Leave a comment »
Posted on October 20, 2015 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
The title could and should also be for the killing of dogs in Serbia as well as Romania.
President of the EU Wojciechowski animal welfare intergroup Janusz Wojciechowski MEP gives a very interesting and informative interview on the dog situation in Romania; the huge finances involved (supplied by the EU) which are NOT being put into sterlilisations and other areas of good animal welfare control. Instead it is going into authority corruption; just as we have said and shown in Serbia over many years of work.
Everything said by Mr. Wojciechowski in the video which can very easily also be applied to the stray animal killing and corruption which is going on in Serbia. Remember that Serbia is currently going through EU accession !
We have learned a lot from this interview and we will now be looking at also taking the same issues to the EU authorities; Commissions and animal welfare Intergroup regarding Serbia’s disgusting treatment of stray animals.
The people at the EU Enlargement Commission responsible for Serbian accession have completely ignored all the data we have presented to them. They are never in response to us – we and all of our evidence are simply ignored.
So now we have to move on and take alternative action(s).
We will aim to also use ‘Public Health’ across the EU as the basis for our evidence. We know that Serbian campaigners can also put pressure on their national authorities about this issues – especially as Serbia wants to join the EU !
As Mr. Wojciechowski declares; the non implementation of providing basic shelters and sterilisations for all stray animals by the Romanian authorities in “very bad”. It is seen that between 250 and 500 Euros of EU money – almost double the monthly wage for Romanians; is being paid by the authorities for the killing of every single stray animal in Romania; whist the same authorities are putting not one Euro into shelters and stray animal sterilisations to reduce animal numbers in the long term.
Oh how all of this stinks of the very same actions by Serbian government and ministry, and regional authorities. Corruption is the big player in Romania, as has now been exposed to the EU Commission and authorities – and the very same thing is happening in Serbia.
We have been trying to expose the corruption and lack of progress by the Serbian authorities for many years. Now the EU is waking up to what is happening in Romania; we have an obligation to provide the EU with all the on going evidence we have regarding the situation in Serbia.
As Mr. Wojciechowski says in the video; Public Health is an EU wide issue, not a national issue as the Romania authorities want everyone to believe. Everthing can be mirrored directly into the Serbian authorities actions and what is being said by the Serbian government and authorities.
The coming months will be interesting !
Video link – Janusz Wojciechowski MEP: Killing dogs in Romania:
Spot the connection:
Romania below
… and here we have Serbia
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Further update 20/10/15.
The above post, including the video link, has now been sent to the EU Animal Welfare Intergroup; members of the EU Enlargement Commission (for Serbia) as well as to Enlargement Commissioner Hahn at the EU.
Our first formal report should finally be produced within the next week and we will provide a link to it on this site for all to see. The report, if necessary will be the first of several detailing the evidence we and others have provided to the Enlargement Commission as well as information from other organisations and groups undertaking animal welfare in Serbia.
If the EU Commission is unprepared to enforce the Serbian authorities to act within Serbia for stray animal legislation; then we are now preparing to take our case to the European Courts. Our report(s) are / will be produced in order to provide full details of what lack of action the EU Enlargement Commission is taking in Serbia regarding enforcement of ‘the Rule of law’; which they at the EU proudly promote and inform us is a paramount requirement for any new state seeking EU accession.
This has now gone beyond ‘Serbia’ national legislation. With the money the EU is providing to Serbia; just like Romania, for alleged animal welfare; none of it is being used to the benefit of animals.
If we have to show this to the EU courts, then we will.
Over the next few weeks we will consider what way we are now to move on, and how we will do it.
For the above video link, replace ‘Romania’ with ‘Serbia’ – this will form the basis of our case. Corruption at the expense of animal deaths.
Public Health in Serbia will now become an EU issue for the new EU member state called Serbia that wishes to join.
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Filed under: CAMPAIGNS - Global Animal Welfare Issues, GENERAL NEWS - International / National / Regional, Romania - Stray Animal Killings 2013, SERBIA (Central Serbia: Capital - Belgrade) and (Serbia, VIDEOS | Leave a comment »
Posted on October 20, 2015 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
American Hunter Corey Knowlton. (Photos: Facebook; Martin Harvey/Getty Images; Flickr)
Rhino Hunter Sues Airline So He Can Bring His Animal Trophy Home
Hunting groups claim Delta’s ban on big game hunting trophies is ‘discriminatory.’
Taylor Hill is an associate editor at TakePart covering environment and wildlife.
Bio
Last year, when Texas big game hunter Corey Knowlton purchased a $350,000 permit to hunt and kill a critically endangered black rhino in Namibia, he did so with the intention of bringing the dead animal back to the U.S. with him.
But that was before a Minnesota dentist shot Cecil, Zimbabwe’s most famous lion, and commercial carriers, under mounting public pressure, banned the transport of lion, elephant, tiger, and rhino trophies on their flights. United, American, and Delta Airlines all joined South African Airways and Emirates, which put such policies in place earlier in 2015, in enacting the ban.
So when Knowlton tried to bring his prized carcass back after a much-scrutinized May 2015 hunt, Delta allegedly denied his request to transport the animal from southern Africa. To Knowlton and a consortium of pro-hunting groups, that’s discrimination against hunters.
In a lawsuit filed Oct. 15, Dallas Safari Club, Houston Safari Club, Conservation Force, Knowlton, and others argue that Delta’s ban on big game trophy transport is unlawful, “robbing the species of the enhancement tourist hunting provides,” the suit claims.
Essentially Knowlton and the pro-hunting groups are arguing two points: Delta can’t discriminate against what its passengers can transport if it’s been deemed “legal cargo” by federal authorities, and the new ban is hindering conservation efforts raised through trophy hunting permit fees like Knowlton’s.
“Delta cannot discriminate against passengers or cargo,” the suit continues. “Trophies of the ‘Big Five’ [lion, elephant, buffalo, leopard, rhinoceros] are not dangerous goods. Delta’s irresponsible embargo appears to be based on misinformation and a misunderstanding of the legal status of these goods, and motivated by a desire to placate a noisy and ill-advised group of Facebook posters, at the expense of conservation programs, wildlife, livelihoods of local peoples, and the interests of plaintiffs.”
Delta Airlines has not responded to a request for comment regarding the suit.
The lawsuit reeks of a publicity stunt, according to Chris Green, executive director of Harvard Law School’s animal law program—and a bad one at that.
“I cannot think of a less sympathetic plaintiff to challenge Delta’s commonsense policy than Corey Knowlton—the Texan who paid to kill one of Africa’s rarest black rhinos,” Green said in an email. “No rational airline ever would want to be associated with transporting this endangered animal’s butchered body out of Africa just to go hang on some rich American’s wall.”
Green was integral in pushing the trophy transport issue into the public domain earlier this year. In May he created a petition calling for Delta to change its policies; it garnered nearly 400,000 signatures.
Now, with the ban in place, he sees the hunting groups’ court challenge and the arguments listed as “desperation.”
“Multiple studies (some of them by the hunting industry itself) have determined that only around 3 percent of trophy hunting revenues ever trickle down to the local communities impacted by such hunting,” Green wrote.
In one of these studies, it was shown that large, captivating species such as elephants are worth a lot more alive than dead—76 times more. That’s because tourists are willing to spend big bucks to visit ecotourism camps in Africa for the chance to see and photograph elephants. The study estimated that just one elephant, over the course of its life, would generate $1.6 million to the local economy compared with the $23,000 or so the animals’ tusks would bring to the black market from poaching or the $40,000 estimated cost for a 10-day legal elephant trophy hunt.
“As we saw with Cecil, nearly all of the income from big game hunting ends up concentrated in the hands of a few (often Western-run) hunting operations that have nothing to do with conservation,” Green wrote.
As for Delta not meeting its legal obligations as a “common carrier” and discriminating against hunters, Green said that’s a stretch.
Filed under: CAMPAIGNS - Global Animal Welfare Issues, GENERAL NEWS - International / National / Regional, HUNTING - Primarily UK and Germany | Leave a comment »
Posted on October 17, 2015 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
British charity saves the life of tiny orangutan left for dead in Borneo.
All photos – Standard and IAR.
A British animal charity has stepped in to help save the life of a baby orangutan who was left out in the sun to die in Borneo.
The baby ape was so lifeless when a team from East Sussex-based International Animal Rescue (IAR) reached him that at first they thought he was dead.
The tiny creature had been dumped and left for dead in a filthy urine-soaked cardboard box.
Lying with his arms folded across his chest, his grey flaking skin and lack of hair made him look corpse-like and “almost mummified”.
IAR officials said the baby, who they named Gito, was found in the village of Hamlet Giet in Simpang Hulu district, 105 miles from their orangutan rehabilitation base in West Borneo.
The baby oranguatan, who was dehydrated and malnourished after being fed entirely on condensed milk, was taken to the IAR clinic by motorbike in an arduous nine-hour journey.
Read more
IAR chief executive Alan Knight said: “It’s hard to stomach the shocking state Gito was in when we rescued him.
“Our team has seen a significant increase in the number of baby orangutans being kept as pets and some of them have only recently been taken from the wild.
“This is the result of the forest fires devastating Indonesia and leaving wild orangutans without food or shelter. Those that escape being burnt alive are left exposed and vulnerable, under threat of starving to death or being killed or captured by human beings.”
During a medical check, Gito was feverish, with stiff hands and feet.
He was found to be suffering from diarrhoea and from sarcoptic mange – a highly-contagious skin disease.
To help relieve him, coconut oil was massaged into Gito’s body to soothe and soften his itchy skin, and he was placed on a drip to help rehydrate him.
Mr Knight added: “Gito is in safe hands now and receiving expert treatment and care at our centre in Ketapang. But tragically there are many more like him in desperate need of our help.”
Forest fires in Ketapang Regency have triggered a rise in the number of orangutans being captured, and an urgent need for funding to help continue the IAR’s work, Mr Knight said.
IAR Links:
Filed under: Animals Requiring Adoption or Homes - Worldwide, GENERAL NEWS - International / National / Regional, PHOTOGRAPHS - **WARNING** (Animal Suffering), SHELTER - Information, The "Serbian Animals Voice (SAV) ALLIANCE | Leave a comment »
Posted on October 17, 2015 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
SAV Comment – It is essential that we support our conservation group friends and find out who this person is. We especially call on our German friends to help us with his identification.
Note that if you click on the photo you will then be allowed to enlarge it – this may further aid in identification. Thanks.
Link:
A German Hunter Killed One of Africa’s Biggest Elephants
Conservation groups in Zimbabwe aim to find the identity of the hunter to give him the ‘Cecil the lion’ treatment.
A German trophy hunter reportedly shot and killed one of the largest elephants recorded in nearly 30 years, and now a Zimbabwean conservation group wants to make him infamous, like the killer of Cecil the lion.
The 40- to 60-year-old elephant was shot just outside Zimbabwe’s Gonarezhou National Park and had tusks weighing more than 100 pounds each, Zimbabwe Conservation T
ask Force chairperson Johnny Rodrigues said in a statement.
“His tusks were so big that they dragged along the ground when he was walking,” Rodrigues said. This elephant was unknown to wildlife rangers at the park and might have wandered across the border from South Africa into Zimbabwe, where the unidentified hunter shot and killed it.
According to The Telegraph, the hunting organization that led the guided hunt has refused to name the hunter, who paid $61,000 to participate in a 21-day excursion that ended Oct. 8 with one dead elephant. But Rodrigues said the conservation group is going to find out the hunter’s identity.
“The authorities and the hunters’ association are trying to protect him, but we’ve got his photograph,” Rodrigues told The Guardian. “We will identify him, and when we do we’ll leave the public to do what they did to Walter Palmer. People like that deserve it.”
The hunter reportedly had the correct permits for hunting on the land, so no illegal activity occurred. But conservationists say the animal’s size made it one of a kind—an animal like that should have been preserved for others to see in the wild, according to Anthony Kaschula, a safari firm operator in Zimbabwe.
“We have no control over poaching but we do have control over hunting policy that should acknowledge that animals such as this one are of far more value alive (to both hunters and non-hunters) than dead,” Kaschula wrote on Facebook. “Individual elephants such as these should be accorded their true value as a National Heritage and should be off limits to hunting. In this case, we have collectively failed to ensure that legislation is not in place to help safeguard such magnificent animals.”
While this elephant might have been killed legally, Zimbabwe national park officials are dealing with a recent rise in elephant poaching incidents, finding 26 more dead elephants this week due to cyanide poisoning—on top of the 14 found poisoned just last week.
As many as 100 elephants are killed each day at the hands of poachers to profit from ivory demand in places such as China, Vietnam, and the United States.
If those numbers continue, African elephants could be extinct within 20 years, according to animal rights advocates.
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Supplement –
Please see our other link on German elephant hunting and the so called ‘conservationist’ involved :
Filed under: GENERAL NEWS - International / National / Regional, HUNTING - Primarily UK and Germany, PHOTOGRAPHS - **WARNING** (Animal Suffering), The "Serbian Animals Voice (SAV) ALLIANCE | Leave a comment »
Posted on October 15, 2015 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Stand With Us for Abandoned Chimps
Dear Mark,
Today, we are rallying outside the New York Blood Center’s headquarters in New York City with many other animal advocates. We have gathered together to call on NYBC to reinstate funding to care for more than 60 chimpanzees that the Center abandoned in Liberia. After decades of research and testing, these animals were left to fend for themselves on islands with no direct access to food or water. Despite an international outcry, NYBC unbelievably continues to deny any responsibility for these chimpanzees. Stand with us wherever you are by sending a letter to NYBC’s officials today — let them know that they need to keep their promise to provide lifetime care for these chimpanzees.
TAKE ACTION HERE
Sincerely,
Wayne Pacelle, President & CEO
Help Abandoned Chimpanzees in Liberia
This year, the New York Blood Center (NYBC) abandoned more than sixty chimpanzees that it had used in research and testing for decades. These animals, located in Liberia — a country on the west coast of Africa — were left in danger of dehydration or starvation and need our help. We are rallying on October 15, along with other animal advocates, in front of NYBC headquarters in New York City to urge the Center to reinstate funding for these chimpanzees. Stand in solidarity with us by writing to NYBC President and CEO Christopher Hillyer today.
In the 1970s, NYBC worked with the Liberian Institute for Biomedical Research to create Vilab II — a laboratory that obtained and bred chimpanzees for use in research and testing. Once NYBC decided that the chimpanzees were no longer needed for research, it was determined that they would be permanently retired on islands near the lab in Monrovia, Liberia. The chimps still live there today and are completely reliant on humans for their survival, as there is no natural fresh water supply throughout the year, nor enough food.
As The New York Times reported, NYBC withdrew all funding and oversight for these chimpanzees in early March, despite previously committing to a lifetime of care. Since then, The Humane Society of the United States and others stepped in to provide care for the chimpanzees and are working to hold NYBC accountable for their disgraceful actions.
TAKE ACTION
NYBC made a commitment to these chimpanzees, and cannot be allowed to simply walk away and leave them to perish. Please contact NYBC President and CEO Christopher Hillyer and tell him to reinstate funding for these chimpanzees immediately!
Filed under: CAMPAIGNS - Global Animal Welfare Issues, GENERAL NEWS - International / National / Regional | Leave a comment »
Posted on October 14, 2015 by Serbian Animals Voice (SAV)
Dear Mark:
A secret branch of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) called The U.S. Meat Animal Research Center has recently been exposed for horrifying experiments on meat-producing animals, so inhumane that even the meat industry itself is rejecting the federal agency’s grisly methods and glaring lack of oversight.
In an attempt to bolster birth rates and factory farm profit margins despite declines in American meat consumption of up to 36%, every year the research center ‘modifies’ some 30,000 cows, pigs and sheep – ending in starvation, ghoulish genetic mutation, and surgical mutilation. With death rates for baby and adult animals greater than THREE TIMES industry standards, mangled corpses are buried en masse in a place called the “Dead Pit”‘ flying in the face of a growing U.S. focus on humanely raised meat.
The taxpayer-funded agency has lain hidden on the Nebraska plains for nearly 50 years since Congress approved its existence.
The USDA says they have addressed the problems. IDA believes the facility must be closed!
Please email USDA head Tom Vilsack now and tell him it’s time to shut down the U.S. Meat Animal Research Center.
Thank you for whatever you can do, today!
Marilyn Kroplick, M.D.
President, In Defense of Animals
IDA is involved in many projects to protect animals’ rights, welfare, and habitats. Money contributed to IDA supports ALL of our worthy programs and gives us the flexibility to respond to emerging needs.
Thank you for your support and consideration.
Filed under: CAMPAIGNS - Global Animal Welfare Issues, GENERAL NEWS - International / National / Regional, GLOBAL PETITIONS - Anything Animal, Anywhere ! | Leave a comment »
Serbian Animals Voice (SAV) 