The brutal death of some 15,000 stray dogs in a private kennel in Romania in two years has shaken the Balkan country and exposed extreme cruelty and possible misappropriation of public funds in the management of those animals, of which 1.5 million have been sacrificed in 25 years.
The scandal brings back to the present a problem that has been entrenched for decades in Romania, where the proliferation of stray dogs dates back to the communist era (1945-1989), when entire neighborhoods were demolished to build blocks, and many owners moved without their animals, which multiplied uncontrollably.
Since then, capture, sterilization and sacrifice campaigns have been combined, without solving the problem, and with estimates that place it at around half a million the number of dogs without owners.
The most recent outrage erupted after images recorded at a center in Suraia circulated on social media, showing acts of extreme violence, with dogs brutally tortured and left to agonize to death.
In Romania, Killing or torturing an animal is punishable by up to seven years in prison.
While the police investigation into that kennel, now closed, continues, a petition signed by more than 200,000 people demands an end to the massacres in those centers.
The business of killing dogs
That facility signed more than a hundred contracts with municipalities throughout the country to collect stray dogs and, to make room for new income, euthanized the animal in a short time. 80% of those he receiveddespite the fact that the law prohibits killing animals in private centers.
Politicians, activists and animal defense NGOs warn that Suraia is not an isolated case, but rather the reflection of a system that has been complaining for years of cruelty and of financially encouraging the sacrifice of dogs.
Romanian municipalities lock up stray dogs in public shelters or in private subcontractors, in a system that moves tens of millions of euros annually throughout the country.
A parliamentary report prepared by independent deputy Aurora Tasica Simu denounces serious irregularities, including mistreatment and possible abuse by local officials and shelter managers.
The document, presented in September after several inspections by legislators of shelters, describes places with dogs without food and puppies abandoned without water.
The report also maintains that in the last 25 years More than one billion euros would have been spent to sacrifice around 1.5 million dogs (almost seven every hour), while with those funds 25 million animals could have been sterilized.
For the deputy, the system has for years favored an economic logic of capture and sacrifice, instead of betting on prevention.
«We must investigate the extermination centers for defenseless animals, financed with public funds,» asks Tasica Simu in statements in Bucharest.
Romanian legislation establishes that dogs found on the street become the responsibility of the municipalities and must be transferred to shelters, where They must be identified, sterilized, vaccinated, returned to their owners or given up for adoption.
Sterilize, do not trap or kill
Culling should be a last resort, after a minimum period of 14 days during which animals can be claimed or adopted, and only if the local authority does not have sufficient space or resources to maintain them.
«There are many abuses and we are talking about deaths. That is why we ask the authorities to replace euthanasia with mass sterilization and to carry out controls in the shelters,» says Ioana Cosma, president of the Justice for Animals Association.
Along the same lines, Andra Darau, representative of the Kola Kariola association, defended that the best solution is a sustained sterilization and registration campaign.
«The solution is not to trap and kill the dog. We have to sterilize them and start a real campaign. And we have to understand the damage that abandonment does. If they are sterilized and registered with a microchip, in six years, at most, this problem would no longer exist,» he says.
Some associations that collect official data on the management of these animals indicate that in a decade more than 200,000 stray dogs died or were euthanized in shelters.
Faced with this situation, volunteers like Gabriela Grecu remember that there are alternatives: since 2013 they have rescued 120 dogs and found homes for many of them.
«Social networks are also useful for this, to find someone who wants to take care of a pet,» he emphasizes.
EFE Agency.
GML
