Dog days in China

Many of you might have read our post regarding the horrible mass-slaughter of dogs in August. Sadly, it seems we could be experiencing the third wave of the canine cull, based on this Economic Daily report (in Chinese) that says five major cities, including Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin, Guangzhou and Wuhan are going to address "dog problems".

Tang Yunli, deputy director of Beijing Public Security Bureau, said the bureau is going to extend its administrative reach to include pet dogs in the city and implement the following measures: 1. convene some meetings on pet dogs; 2. focus on problems such as dogs without licenses, large dogs, households with multiple dogs, dogs that are walked without leashes, dogs in public venues and related public sanitation issues, etc. 3. dividing the work into public relations, inspections, enforcement, and evaluation. 4. establish an all-around, long term management system. 5. Publicize and supervise citizens in registering their pet dogs, as well as vaccine the dogs regularly.

Tang also said Beijing Public Security Bureau hopes to achieve in the future a 100 percent register rate, 100 vaccination rate for registered dogs, spreading information as fully as possible and limiting the number stray dogs to as little as possible. Furthermore, they hope that there will be no large dogs, violent dogs and more than one dog to a family in the downtown area, with no big dogs allowed on the street (or chained and housed if in rural area), no walking of dogs in public locations such as supermarkets, shops, commercial streets, restaurant, park, green areas, schools, and hospitals. Other goals include making sure that dogs are leashed when being walked, do not urinate wherever they please, banning illegal dog markets and the street sale of dogs, regulating veterinary hospitals and lastly, decreasing the number of cases of dogs attacking residents. All this in order to build a beautiful and HARMONIOUS Beijing.

Jiang Xianfa, deputy director of Shanghai Public Security Bureau said Shanghai’s problem is mainly one of unlicensed pet dogs, households with more than one dog and uncivilized behaviour of dog owners.

Wu Shunchang, director of Tianjin Public Security Bureau introduced that they have started working on "dogs management" since September 12, and since then the unlicensed dogs and walking dogs without a leash have been effectively curbed. In one month's time, there were 20,487 newly registered dogs, and the police caught 5,437 strays (though we wonder what happened to them).

He Jing, deputy director of Guangzhou Public Security Bureau said the police are going to take three measures to control the dogs in the city: 1. promote the laws among citizens, 2. regional police checks (i.e. raids) of homes to ensure that people register and vaccinate their dogs and 3. crack down on the illegal fostering of dogs and the numbers of stray dogs in the streets, thereby, they say, improving the living environment for citizens.

Xia Zhigang, deputy director of Wuhan Public Security Bureau said they set up limited areas for dog owners early in 1995, now they are going to set up a no-dogs area and enforce the implanting of pet dogs with digital chips.

Of course we KNOW what’s going on here, the recent soaring reports of dogs attacking residents, you can see here, here and here (in Chinese). The ban on major pet forums (see luckycats announcement here and Chinapetforum announcement here) discuss the dog-related measures in the city. There is also a lot of discussion in the BBS of this animal protection site started by dog lovers, including a petitions against the injuring and killing of dogs. You can also read an English report here.

We have also found unconfirmed stories, not found in any official reports, of a middle-school girl in Beijing who jumped off the fifteenth floor of a building when the Man came to take away her dog. She, the story says, pleaded with them as they tied up her whimpering dog, finally threatening to jump out the window if they took the dog away. The dog authorities called her bluff -- except it wasn't a bluff.

As an animal lover, we felt sickened and furious at all the pictures of dogs beaten to death we came across while searching for information for this post. Sadly, it reminds us of the crazy sparrow campaign dating back to some 40 years ago, though the victims are now innocent dogs and some predict that stray cats will be next. This BBS thread (in Chinese) in a cat forum claims that Beijing is will start its campaign against stray cats starting November 7. Luckycats.net, an NGO dedicated to saving and helping stray cats, released this a announcement today as well, and though the information is somewhat vague, it seems that the crackdown on stray cats will last until November 24-25. Fucking hell! Be aware, Shanghai residents, if this is happening in Beijing, it could happen here in probably next few month.

As a Chinese, this Shanghaiist feels ashamed and extremely infuriated -- what's wrong with these government officials? Why do innocent animals have to pay for mistakes of human beings? Why has the Chinese government all of a sudden retrogressed 10 years? And who can help the animals in China?

On an ironic note, all of this is happening in the Year of the Dog.