Starved, stuffed and slaughtered! Dogs face cruelty during China's Yulin festival
21 Jun 2016 12:52 PM IST
Many of the victim dogs are believed to have been pets stolen from their owners.
A city in southern China went ahead with an annual dog-meat eating festival despite heavy criticism and protests from animal rights activists.- Dog meat restaurants have been forced to take the festival indoors and large-scale open air dog-meat consumption is no longer seen.
- Activists said rallies held around the country to oppose dog eating, as well as outrage on social media from the growing ranks of dog lovers, are already having an effect.
- Promoters say eating dog meat during the summer helps ward off the heat and maintain a healthy metabolism.
- As many as 10,000 dogs are believed to be killed during the event, which falls around the summer solstice that arrived on Monday this year.
- They are stuffed in cages, and trucked to the city about 2,000 kilometers (1,250 miles) south of Beijing in the province of Guangxi, often without food or water.
- Many of the dogs are believed to have been pets stolen from their owners or simply picked up off the street.
- An estimated 10 million to 20 million dogs are killed for their meat each year in China, and the Yulin event has become a lightning rod for criticism.
- Activists bought dogs from dealers who had been planning to slaughter them, while local residents complained that outsiders were ruining what they consider a local tradition.
- The event has come to symbolize the cruelty and potential for spreading disease associated with the largely unregulated industry.
- Vendors slaughtered dogs and cooked their meat in dozens of restaurants across the city of Yulin.
A city in southern China went ahead with an annual dog-meat eating festival despite heavy criticism and protests from animal rights activists.
Many of the victim dogs are believed to have been pets stolen from their owners.
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