Hundreds of monkeys being bred for laboratories in Europe are killed for growing too large, claims animal rights group

• WARNING: GRAPHIC IMAGES
• The disturbing images show discarded dead monkeys stacked in piles on the floor or dumped in rubbish bins
• Mutilated bodies can also be seen in a skip awaiting incineration, according to the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection

Animal rights activists have published shocking pictures and video of hundreds of monkeys they claim were killed because they were too big for testing in British laboratories.

The disturbing images show discarded dead monkeys stacked in piles on the floor or dumped in rubbish bins. 

Mutilated bodies can also be seen in a skip awaiting incineration, according to the British Union for the Abolition of Vivisection.

The group claims the unwanted healthy primates were given lethal injections in the heart and then burned on a monkey-breeding farm on the holiday island of Mauritius.

British firms are said to pay £260 a time for the animals – but overseas labs are said to only be interested in those weighing less than 3.5kg.

BUAV claims pregnant monkeys and babies are also being slaughtered at the Noveprim breeding farm, a major exporter of as many as 10,000 moneys a year to the UK, Spain and the USA.

BUAV Director Sarah Kite last night called on the British government to order an immediate ban on the import of monkeys from the Indian Ocean island.

‘This is a cruel and senseless slaughter,’ she said. ‘It is unacceptable that monkeys who have been exploited for years are now simply discarded because they are of no further use to this company.

‘These monkeys should be released into the wild so that they can live out the rest of their lives freely. By importing monkeys from this company, the UK is perpetuating this appalling cruelty,’ she added.

Shocking: Animal rights activists have published pictures of hundreds of monkeys they claim were killed because they were too big for testing in British laboratories

Mauritius is the world’s second-largest exporter of long-tailed macaques for research.

Three-quarters of the monkeys are used for toxicology tests on new drugs. The others are tested in studies for conditions such as Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s and Aids.

In 2011, 518 monkeys were exported to the UK from Mauritius. The previous year, the number was even higher at 1,059. Only America bought more.

BUAV said it believes the killings started at the beginning of October and will continue until the end of next month.

A Noveprim spokesman wasn’t available for comment last night.

News Link:-: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2225035/Hundreds-monkeys-bred-laboratories-Europe-killed-growing-large-claims-animal-rights-group.html#ixzz2An5E1ypo
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Lab Monkeys in Israel Get Reprieve – For Now

A recent Israeli Supreme Court decision has temporarily barred the shipment of 90 monkeys to research labs in the United States.  Mazor Farm, where the monkeys are being farmed, must now provide documentation proving it operates within Israel’s legal framework for captive animals.

Many people imagine the typical Israeli farm as a peaceful, lush, agrarian landscape.  In the case of Mazor Farm, they would be wrong.

Founded in 1991, this breeding facility for laboratory monkeys has become a primary target of Israel’s animal rights community.  Mazor Farm receives monkeys caught in the wild predominantly from the island of Mauritius.  These animals are then bred and the offspring sold to laboratories around the world for use in various types of research.  The facility currently holds an estimated 1,500 long tailed macaque monkeys.

Let the Animals Live, an Israel-based animal rights group, petitioned the Israeli Supreme Court in March, asking it to overturn a Central District Court decision allowing Mazor Farm to export 90 female long-tailed macaques to Shin Nippon Biomedical Laboratories in Seattle.

At issue is a subtle question of Israeli law.  Regulations permit animal export only for medical research whose goal is either to save human lives or reduce human suffering.  The Israel Nature and Parks Authority, which issues the relevant export permits, told the court it plans to reexamine whether Mazor Farm’s application met the necessary criteria.  The Israeli Supreme Court subsequently issued a temporary block of the export.

To read the rest of this news click here:-http://www.greenprophet.com/2012/05/lab-monkeys-israel/

The dogs on death row in paradise: One English woman’s battle to take on a holiday island which cruelly kills thousands of pet dogs a year

• More than 20,000 pet and stray dogs are brutally slayed annually in Mauritius
• Undercover investigation after alarm raised by the British-based charity
• Up to 80 per cent are much-loved pets snatched from doorsteps
• Pound can only be described as a concentration camp for dogs

The dog is flat on his back, trussed up with a rough rope, his paws scrabbling frantically in the air as a man in a red baseball cap rams a needle deep into his heart.

There is one last desperate struggle then a monstrous howl that rips  through the muggy tropical morning, startling nearby market traders and silencing the birds.

When the howl splutters into a whimper, the dog is dragged and kicked into a kennel to die alongside three others. It is a slow and painful death, the result of a botched lethal injection by a canine-killing squad.

And it takes place in the so-called tropical paradise of Mauritius — the palm-fringed holiday destination of more than 200,000 Britons each year.

Away from the white, gleaming beaches — where the sea is impossibly blue and tourists sip cocktails while lazing on luxury sunbeds — more than 20,000 pet and stray dogs are slayed annually in this sickening way

These horrific images of the slaughter were taken during an undercover investigation by the Mail after the alarm was raised by the British-based charity International Animal Rescue.

The Mauritian government claims it is a humane way of controlling the island’s stray dog population, but it is neither humane nor honest.

Cruel: An MSPCA dog catcher nets a dog before throwing it into the van where it will be taken off to the pound

Death sentence: When it arrives at the pound the dog has three days before it is thrown into a mass grave at the grave yard in Port Louis

Some of the animals are strays but many more — up to 80 per cent — are much-loved pets that have been snatched from their doorsteps, with collars and security tags clearly marking their addresses.

They are captured as part of a ‘clean-up’ campaign, despite pleas from animal welfare organisations across the world.

And they are killed by an organisation with a name so ironic it would be laughable it wasn’t true — the Mauritian Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

Kitted out in jaunty red caps and wielding giant fishing nets, MSPCA dog-catchers snatch animals wherever they see them — sleeping on street corners, lingering in alleys or lazing on their own doorsteps.

They are scooped up and hurled into cages in the back of roasting-hot vans where they remain — often bleeding and with broken bones — while the officers continue their rounds.

Caged: MSPCA personnel march around in heavy boots, brandishing sharp metal rods to punish disobedient animals. In the filthy concrete cages, most of the dogs shrink to the back, shivering and terrified

Their destination is a pound that can only be described as a concentration camp for dogs.
MSPCA personnel march around in heavy boots, brandishing sharp metal rods to punish disobedient animals. In the filthy concrete cages, most of the dogs shrink to the back, shivering and terrified.

Others edge forward, hopeful and trusting, unable to understand their predicament.

The worst corner is the puppy cage — rusty, squalid with faeces, and utterly desolate.

Only animals with owners have any hope, and even then it is slim. If residents suspect their pet has been snatched by the MSPCA, they can come to the pound and pay a ransom to rescue it. But the charge is £30, which is beyond the reach of most people, as the average worker earns less than £60 a month.

Nearly all the dogs spend three days in the cages before a lethal injection and a slow, painful death.

The still-warm bodies are hurled into a mass open grave in a stretch of wasteland. Clumps of fur, tails and ears are visible in the red soil. Skulls and bones create splashes of white.

The MSPCA insists only stray dogs are exterminated but this is a lie. The truth is that the organisation has a quota of more than 100 stray dogs to capture every day in a bid to reduce the island’s estimated 200,000 population

Helpless: The worst corner is the puppy cage - rusty, squalid with faeces, and utterly desolate. Only animals with owners have any hope, and even then it is slim

And officers will happily take pets to achieve this figure.

British woman Alicia Browne can testify to this, after her two dogs were snatched while she was walking them.

Alicia, who is staying in Mauritius for nine months to visit a friend, adopted two stray dogs — whom she called Mira and Wanda — on the waterfront near Riv du Rempart in the north-east.

She recalls: ‘I was with them on the beach in December, throwing sticks, just having a nice day, when these two guys ran down with their nets and threw them over Mira and Wanda.

‘I screamed, “What are you doing! These are my dogs!” Mira and Wanda could not have been more than 4ft away from me. But one of the dog-catchers said I was breaking the law: because they weren’t on a leash, they were strays, and that was that.’

Alicia, from Redhill, Surrey, adds: ‘I was in tears and ran after them and saw them dumped in the van like trash. Mira’s leg was cut — you can see the scars and she has a limp now.

‘I followed the van in my car for the rest of the morning while the men scooped up pet after pet then went to the pound where they were unloaded.

‘I had to pay to get my dogs back. Wanda will never be the same again — she was severely traumatised by the experience.’

Jacqueline Woodridge, a British expat living in Mauritius, lost her pet dog in January and went to the Port Louis MSPCA compound to try to find him.

Lucky ones: Alicia Browne (35) from Redhill Surrey with her two dogs Wanda (left) and Mira (right) who she saved from the dog pound after the dog catchers snatched her pets from the beach.

Her search was unsuccessful — and shocking. She said: ‘What I saw was horrific. There were so many beautiful dogs, many, many with collars, including puppies, squeezed into dirty kennel chambers covered with urine and faeces.

 ‘They were trembling, whining, and terrified. There was just one bowl of bread and water in each kennel.’

While the population of strays is undoubtedly large and growing, the dogs are not dangerous: there is no rabies on Mauritius, and the strays shun human contact.

Local and international vets agree that sterilisation would stem the problem — indeed, three years ago French actress Brigitte Bardot offered to pay for a mass sterilisation for all the island’s strays. But the government will not consider it. 

Yesterday, phone calls to the MSPCA were not returned. German vet Birgit Wellmann, who had to rescue her own dog from a pound, said: Sterilisation is the way forward but no one will listen. It is heartbreaking.’

She claims people on the island won’t criticise the MSPCA for fear of veiled retribution. Foreigners worry about losing residency and work permits, and locals are vulnerable to arrest if they defame the government.

Authorities say the strays are an eyesore and jeopardise the lucrative tourism trade. But as one European vet who used to work on the island points out: ‘For most tourists, these dogs are less dangerous than sunburn.’

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2127922/The-dogs-death-row-paradise-One-English-womans-battle-holiday-island-cruelly-kills-thousands-pet-dogs-year.html#ixzz1stdh3ELA