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Bred, raised and killed solely for the fur
industry
The dogs and cats killed for their fur in China are generally raised on
breeding farms, cold unsanitary breeding compounds, many are located in
Northern China. These cats and dogs are literally 'farmed' for their
fur. Often, breeders are not businesses as such, but a large number come
from Chinese families that keep a few cats, or dogs, in appalling
conditions, often these pitiful animals are kept outside so that their coat
grows thicker. At the
beginning of the winter they kill the dogs or cats and sell the pelts to fur
traders. Many of the villages have open-air fur markets that serve as
collection points for the pelts of cats and dogs killed locally. Others are
stolen companion animals, and some are abandoned strays.
| The larger breeding
farms, referred to by the German journalist Karreman as "worse than
concentration camps", keep up to 300 animals at a time in appalling,
squalid conditions. Diseases such as parvo virus, canine distemper and
leptospirosis spread like wildfire in dogs whose immune system is
already low due to depression and starvation. Live dogs, chained by thin
metal wires, many of them pups under six months old, are kept in dark,
windowless and bitterly cold sheds, surrounded by the bodies of dead
dogs hanging from hooks. |
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This is how the dogs live out their
grim existence before being crammed into filthy tight sacks to make the
harrowing journey to the slaughterhouse - a trip which could take up to
three days while they suffer without food and water. They go their whole
unbearable lives from the very beginning to final brutal end without ever having
known one single kind word, or soft stroke.
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In Harbin dogs were witnessed kept in dark,
unheated buildings in the bitter cold of winter without food or water. They were tethered by
thin metal wires. The butcher at this place kills 10 to 12 dogs a day
selling their fur, his wife transports the dogs from the breeding farms
in the north. |
| Dogs in China suffer unspeakable
terror and pain before being slaughtered for their fur. Stuffed
into sacks for transport, left in the cold without food and water.
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Even the
youngest - puppies are not spared.
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By the
time the animals reach the slaughterhouses many are sick, dying,
and some are dead. Investigators watched a truck arrive one evening,
densely packed with dogs. "We had to watch these dogs being killed
without showing any emotion," Swain says faintly in a strained,
heartfelt voice. "It was a difficult, devastating experience,
crying
inside while speaking calmly.
After a while your soul
gets eroded. But it has to be done, otherwise you can't deal with such
people."
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