Activist frees 1,000 dogs from the dog meat festival in Yulin

Lo statunitense Marc Ching è riuscito ad ottenere la liberazione di numerosi animali in procinto di essere macellati e mangiati.

The Chinese city of Yulin kicked off its traditional dog meat festival on the 21st of June. During the 10-day celebration, which marks the beginning of summer, thousands of dogs are slaughtered (often in the cruellest ways, including torturing and boiling them alive) and eaten. More than 10,000 dogs are expected to be killed, most of which are caught in the streets, while others are even stolen from their owners. Overall, 10,000 to 20,000 dogs are killed for their meat each year in China. Even more Western countries are considering the event a barbaric tradition, yet they eat other animals on a regular basis just because of a different perception of them.

Festival della carne di cane di Yulin
Dogs being sold during the traditional dog meat festival in Yulin, China

The man who saves dogs

American activist Marc Ching, founder of the Animal Hope & Wellness Foundation, went to Yulin just ahead of the festival and tried to save as many dogs as he could. Ching and his companion, Valarie Ianniello, managed to free more than 1,000 dogs detained in six slaughterhouses. It’s not the first time that Ching saves animals in Asia. Last year, for instance, he succeeded in closing some slaughterhouses in Cambodia.

How he managed to do it

Ching used different strategies to save the dogs. He bought some of them and sent them back to the United States for rehabilitation. In other cases, he convinced the slaughterhouses’ owners to give up their activity and shut facilities down, in exchange for money to start a new business.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Tglww-Y-Bk

The opposition of the local government

Authorities have many times hindered Ching’s work, by beating and detaining him on his way to Yulin. Despite the local government doesn’t support the festival officially, Ching denounced that police tried to prevent him from going to and documenting violence in slaughterhouses.

Marc Ching con due cani
Marc Ching, activist and founder of the Animal Hope & Wellness Foundation

Chinese people say no to the massacre

Many Chinese activists are taking part in the festival, urging to stop killing humans’ best friend in the name of a culinary tradition. “We came to Yulin to tell people here dogs are our friends,” said Yang Yuhua, a volunteer from the central city of Chongqing. “They should not kill dogs in such a cruel way and many of the dogs they killed are pet dogs”.

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