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24 March, 2006

NATIONAL DAY OF ACTION AGAINST CRUEL LIVE EXPORT TRADE IN THE WAKE OF ANIMALS AUSTRALIA’S MIDDLE EAST INVESTIGATION!

Animal advocates across Australia are holding a National Day of Action against the live animal export trade on Saturday, March 25. This follows the recent investigation of animal handling and slaughter methods in five Middle Eastern countries by Animals Australia earlier this year. Against Animal Cruelty Tasmania (AACT) will be holding a protest outside Roberts Real Estate in Hobart’s Sandy Bay at 11.30 a.m. as part of the action, and to highlight the continued role of Roberts in the industry in Tasmania.

The investigation, carried out in January by Animals Australia’s Communications Director Lyn White, identified appalling cruelty to sheep and cattle in Egypt, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and Bahrain. “Sixty Minutes” ran a story in February showing cattle at the infamous Bassetin slaughterhouse in Egypt having leg tendons slashed and eyes stabbed to disable and disorient them.

AACT’s Live Export Campaign Co-ordinator, Suzanne Cass, said:

“Australia has been sending animals to the Middle East for 30 years, to face shocking cruelty. The industry and the government are well aware of what happens to these animals in these countries, and have tried to convince the Australian community that Australia’s involvement in this trade in animal suffering makes a contribution to improvements in animal welfare in these countries.

“In particular, they have made those claims about the Bassetin slaughterhouse in Egypt, going so far as to cite it as “best practice”, Ms Cass continued. “If what we saw on “Sixty Minutes” is “best practice”, God help us. Lyn White also filmed and documented similarly egregious cruelty to sheep in Bassetin, and sheep and cattle in Kuwait (where 75,000 sheep from Tasmania were sent on the “Al Messilah” last month were sent), Oman, Qatar, and Bahrain”.

Film footage from Egypt, Kuwait and Oman has been provided to the Australian media and to the government, with additional footage from Qatar and Bahrain still to be released. The material documents, and shows sheep being hog-tied, slammed into the boots of cars, manhandled to slaughter (with no apparent religious observance) by dragging by one leg, or their ears or heads, and their throats being sawed at as they lie piled on top of one another bleeding to death. Cattle in Kuwait are slammed to the ground by their tails, and the film shows animals struggling to get to their feet with blood gushing from their necks.

“I have been working with this campaign for some years now”, said Ms Cass, “and I have been totally sickened by what is clearly gratuitous cruelty in all these countries. We have developed information packages for Miles Hampton of Roberts, David Byard from the TFGA (Tasmanian Farmers and Graziers Association), and Minister for Primary Industries Steve Kons, appealing to them to watch the film in its entirety, read the reports, and really search their consciences”.

Ms Cass said that AACT was seeking a meeting with the stakeholders in the industry in Tasmania in the wake of this new investigation.

“75,000 Tasmanian sheep, and 500 dairy cattle from Victoria left Devonport last month for Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, and it is not as if these concerns have not been made very clear to the federal and state governments before”, said Ms Cass. “But this new film footage is just so awful - really the stuff of which nightmares are made, and the truth cannot be hidden any longer”

“We want to meet with Mr Kons after he has seen this material, and get an honest answer from him about whether this is what he will continue to allow to happen to animals from Tasmania”, Ms Cass concluded.

For further information, please contact Live Export Campaign Co-ordinator, Suzanne Cass, 0414 726 935.