Pakistanis are shaming Karachi authorities over their poisoning of at least 700 stray dogs. City officials counter that the canines bite thousands of people yearly, and there is no other way to curb the problem.
The poisoning of dogs got a fierce reaction from social network users, with most of them being outraged at the authorities’ actions.
“Just bloody horrible”, “Spread the word. Shame on Karachi authorities!”, “No more cruelty” were just a few among the angry messages.
Dog corpses were lying along the streets of the 20-million city, and the city employees have been disposing of them.
“At least 700 dogs have been killed only in two areas of Karachi’s south in the last couple of days,” Sattar Javed, a spokesman for the municipal authority, confirmed to Reuters.
Here’s how the authorities kill the strays: they hide poison tablets in chicken meat, and give the meat to the animals.
The Pakistani animal rights activists have spoken out against the practice, but the city authorities said there is no other way to cope with the growing population of dogs, which attack the locals.
According to statistics, last year, Karachi’s Jinnah Hospital treated 6,500 people bitten by dogs, and this year saw about 3,700 incidents, according to Dr Seemin Jamali, head of the emergency room, as quoted by Reuters.
Officials don’t have the exact estimates of the total number of strays killed at the moment. However, they say that thousands should be culled in total.
Courtesy of https://www.rt.com
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Many developing countries, and a few developed ones, have serious problems of animal “over population” (domestic or wild), but I do not think this is the way to deal with stray dogs…
There are far better and humane ways of dealing with the problem of stray dogs than cold blooded mass murder, and I am positive that the UN or some other international bodies would have been more than ready to provide funding and expertise to deal with this issue decisively and sensibly, if the local authorities in Afghanistan had only bothered to ask for help.
Unfortunately, attitude of some cultures towards dogs, especially in the Muslim world, which has no basis in Islam, and only given a semblance of ‘Islamic acceptance’, through what is obviously fabricated Hadiths : as they contradict Quran, may be a factor towards this callousness against helpless creatures..
(Contrary to these Hadith narrations of dogs being dirty, impure or in some cases, the devil (black dogs) that should be killed, Allah (SWT) mentioned a dog in the Quran alongside the dwellers of the cave, who are described as righteous..The question does arise : why would Allah (SWT) mention a dog in this light, if dogs were impure and forbidden for believers..? )
These dogs could have been trapped, captured and put away in a safe place or several safe places, where they can be allowed to live out the rest of their lives, posing no danger to anyone…Some may even be trained and become helpful in certain areas..
After all, dogs are man’s best friend, but even as man’s best friend, what chance has dogs got in cultures where own flesh and blood are murdered constantly to restore non existent family honours.. ? Very sad indeed…
Hope the Gambia won’t fall in the same dog over population scenario because dog meat may end up in Chebiyappiharr.
Bax , I totally agree with you in this case because there are better ways they can deals with these dogs . The only concern I have is that, the way you advocated for the lives of these dogs , you should have advocated far more for the lives of peaceful protesters who were also tortured , raped and murdered in the cold blood . The lives of peaceful protesters were far more important than the lives of these dogs which you defended and advocated . All lives matter but human life is far more important than the lives of these dogs . This is just a reminder . Thank you .
Of course, human life is more precious (to us humans) than any other lives and this is why I always maintain that, where other options exist, lives should not be put at risk to achieve political change…
And where the need to put lives at risk becomes unavoidable, especially under the current climate, then my view is that we must have the numbers to achieve our aims…That’s my position.
The events you alluded to are gone and have now become history, but the effects are still being felt..Obviously, our views on the political gains (if any) are different but I can only hope that lessons have been learnt and that the next time we decide to confront Jammeh, we do not leave him standing, otherwise, we will have the same problems…