Dog meat festival in China: Dog rescue (photos)

23 มิถุนายน 2558

Most meat dogs in China are stolen pets & strays & eating dog is unusual in most parts of China which has a growing animal rights movement among the 30 million households that keep dogs as pets.

Dog meat festival in China: Dog rescue (photos)

Vendors wait for customers to buy dogs in cages at a market in Yulin, in southern China's Guangxi province on June 21, 2015. The city holds an annual festival devoted to dog meat on the summer solstice which has provoked an increasing backlash from animal rights activists. AFP PHOTO

ANIMAL RIGHTS

Chinese woman pays to rescue 100 dogs from meat festival: report

21/06/2015
AFP News agency

Animal loving activists use a dog carrying a basket with a message in Chinese "Child for sale" along a street in Yulin, in southern China's Guangxi province to protest the annual dog meat festival. AFP PHOTO

YULIN (CHINA) - A Chinese woman has paid over $1,000 to save 100 canines from being eaten during a dog meat festival, media said Sunday, as activists have lashed out at the event labelling it cruel.

Animal-loving Yang Xiaoyun paid about 7,000 yuan (US$1,100) to save around 100 dogs in the southern city of Yulin on Saturday, web portal Netease reported.

The city holds an annual festival devoted to dog meat on the summer solstice, which has provoked an increasing

A dog looks out from its cage at a stall as it is displayed by a vendor as he waits for customers during the dog meat festival (Source: AFP)

backlash from animal protection activists.

Reports said that Yang, 65, plans to re-house the dogs at her home nearly 2,000 kilometres (124 miles) away in Tianjin.

Pictures posted online showed her browsing a market in Yulin where the dogs were kept in cages.

Activists, who say the festival is cruel, have in the past travelled to the city to hold demonstrations, sometimes buying dogs to save them from the cooking pots.

Locals have been quoted as saying that animals are killed in a humane way for the festival, where their meat is then served with lychee fruit.

Cages of dogs waiting to be sold for meat. Most meat dogs in China are stolen pets & strays. (Source: AFP)

MEAT DOGS: STOLEN PETS & STRAYS

A big pile of lychee fruit in a market (Source: Wikipedia)

The majority of "meat dogs" in China are stolen pets and stray dogs, according to an investigation published this month by Hong Kong-based charity Animals Asia, though eating dog is unusual in most parts of China.

Around 30 million households in China are estimated to keep dogs as pets, helping to fuel the growing animal rights movement in China.

This year the dog meat festival has been targeted by British Comedian Ricky Gervais, who posted a series of messages on Twitter with the hashtag "StopYuLin2015".

The city's government has tried to distance itself from the event.

"Some residents of Yulin have the habit of coming together to eat lychees and dog meat during the summer solstice," the city's news office wrote on Sina Weibo, a Chinese Twitter equivalent.

"The 'summer solstice lychee and dog meat festival' is a commercial term, the city has never (officially) organised a 'dog meat festival'," it added.

Eating dog is not illegal in China, but the government called on meat vendors to respect food safety laws.

"Yulin is an open, tolerant and civilised city," it said. "We welcome people across the world to pay attention to Yulin."