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MONTH: December 2006

First Beijing dog purge in five years brings unprecedented rally

BEIJING--Either "The Year of the Dog" ended in Beijing with the first major dog purge in the city since March 2001, or with the introduction of world-standard animal sheltering and adoption practices, depending on whether one asks activists or officials. Possibly a bit of both happened.

The few certainties are that the dog laws enforced in November 2006 by the Beijing Public Security Bureau, Agriculture Bureau, and Administration for Industry & Commerce were of dubious value in ensuring public safety; that the crackdown was openly motivated by concern for keeping the streets clean and safe before the 2008 Olympics; and that the outcome may have been "killing the dog to scare the monkey," as animal advocates gathered on November 11 outside the Beijing Zoo in a globally reported protest.

Faced with the prospect of similar embarrassment by human rights demonstrators as the Olympics approach, Beijing authorities appeared to use the pro-dog rally to rehearse containment tactics.

The episode began, summarized China Daily, when the Public Security Bureau announced in October that it would begin enforcing bans introduced in 2003 on keeping dogs who are more than 14 inches tall and keeping multiple dogs in nine designated parts of Beijing. Keeping multiple dogs and dogs of any size is permitted in the more distant Beijing suburbs and outside the city.

"On November 8, police made house calls in Beijing's luxury villa areas to check on illegal dog keeping," China Daily said. "They discovered six large unlicensed dogs. By November 13, the canine inspection section of the municipal bureau of public security had rounded up 500 stray, unlicensed, or abandoned dogs."

That would be an ordinary week's animal control intake in many U.S. cities, but U.S. animal control departments typically respond to complaints about specific dogs.

The Beijing Public Security Bureau struggled to convince citizens, and the world, that impounded large dogs are not being killed, as thousands of other dogs were in other parts of China, both earlier in 2006, and in simultaneous purges in other cities, driven by fear of rabies.

"We have received reports that pet dogs are being bludgeoned to death in their owners' homes and on the streets, as well as being strangled, electrocuted, and even buried alive," an Animals Asia Foundation alert asserted on November 16.

The Hong Kong-based Animals Asia Foundation on November 24 offered muzzling as an alternative to the large dog roundup--and offered to distribute 50,000 free "humane muzzles" donated by animal behavioral scientist Roger Mugford. "Pray that the authorities in China recognise an initiative which will help both animals and people alike," said founder Jill Robinson.

As of the beginning of December, however, the Public Security Bureau had not been discredited by photos of dead dogs, or video of actual killing. A widely circulated photo of the hanging pelts of captured stray dogs was actually taken on November 6, in Suining, in southwest Sichuan province. Other photos of police violence against dogs emerged on October 31 from Hangzhou, in Zhejiang province.

But there was no scarcity of evidence of rough handling in Beijing, much of it likely to lead to dogs' deaths, and were many online allegations of killing.

"I came from Beijing, and I'm in the United Kingdom," began one of the most detailed pleas for international intervention. "My name is Si Zhang. Here is what happens every day: police come to houses that are reported to have big dogs. They don't talk too much and they soon take away the dogs. If the dogs resist, the police kill them in front of their owners. Even if the dogs are not killed in front of their owners, lots of them will still be killed somewhere else," Si Zhang said, "because they are illegal and have nowhere else to go.

"Many dogs have already been killed," Si Zhang continued. "They got extremely terrified in the small camp where innumerable illegal dogs were kept all together, so they fought with each other and barked all day. When this happened, they were just thrown into a fire and burnt to die.

"I have a Golden retriever at home in Beijing," Si Zhang said. "I had to ask my parents to send him away to a far away countryside place, because I don't want him to get killed just because he is big. Not everybody is as lucky as I am to be able to send their dogs to somewhere safe," Si Zhang finished. "What they can do is just pray for their dogs, wishing nobody will knock on their door the next morning."

Police defend actions

Beijing Public Security Management Bureau deputy director Bao Suixian at a November 14 press conference sought to strike a balance among the interests of dog-keepers and other citizens.

"People have the right to have dogs, but people who don't have dogs also have rights," Bao Suixian said. "People are worried about dogs attacking and injuring them," with reason, as more than 70,000 dog bites were reported in Beijing during the first 10 months of 2006, up 18% from 2005.

Human rabies cases, nationally, were up 30% in September, when 318 people died. The national total for 2006 topped 2,250, threatening to exceed the 2004 total of 2,651. While most of the rabies cases occurred in the southern and coastal regions where dogs are often raised for meat, and no cases have originated in Beijing in many years, 10 victims were flown to Beijing for palliative care.

Bites reportedly typically occurred in crowded elevators and on the narrow stairways of the tenement apartment blocks that house most Beijing residents, where neither humans nor dogs can escape accidental confrontations.

"Bao also denied that some dog shelters killed dogs that have been collected from the streets or previous owners," wrote China Daily reporter Xie Chuanjiao.

"We have set up special homes to house stray dogs and unlawfully large and aggressive dogs, fearing they might threaten public security," Bao said. "But we have never heard of them being slaughtered. Dogs are man's best friend. We still treat them like friends after taking them in."

"The official said the government does not condone the slaughter of dogs, unless they have rabies," Xie Chuanjiao continued--and the next day went looking for the shelters.

"Beijing and neighbouring Hebei Province are establishing more homes for the increasing number of stray and illegal dogs," the Security Bureau told Xie Chuanjiao.

"One of these centers is the Beijing Canine Shelter and Inspection Centre located in Qiliqu Town, Changping District, in the north of the city," Xie Chuanjiao reported, appearing to describe the facility at which the Beijing Association for Small Animal Protection has operated a grooming and adoption program since 2004.

"To date, the center has received more than 500 dogs," Xie Chuanjiao continued.

"With four buildings for large dogs, eight rows of kennels for small dogs, a quarantine zone, an isolation zone and an adoption zone, the center is capable of holding more than 1,000 dogs," canine administration bureau chief Huang Zhimin told Xie Chuanjiao.

"The centre also has a hospital and a dog cafeteria," Xie Chuanjiao recounted, "while professional pet attendants and training experts ensure the dogs are treated well."

Xie Chuanjiao went on to give contact information for prospective adopters.

"In Zhuozhou, Hebei Province," Xie Chuanjiao added, citing the Xinhua News Agency, "the local government yesterday allocated one million yuan ($125,000 U.S.) to set up four major dog fostering stations. A local official said they would shelter illegal dogs sent to the area from Beijing. The official said local vets would provide professional care, and a local military dog training base would contribute to scientific and rational management of the stations."

Responded Irene Zhang of Animal Rescue Beijing, "Those dogs used to have a family with love. Now they are forced to leave their owners and stay in a strange, cold place. How could that make them happy and healthy? The purebreds might be sold," Zhang speculated, "or be used as breeders. The mixed breeds have no value for the government people. Maybe some lucky ones would be saved for reporters to take photos. Please note," Zhang added, "that Hebei province is notorious for the fur and dog meat business."

New York Times correspondent Jim Yardley on November 14 described the efforts of Animal Rescue Beijing founder Wu Tianyu to keep dogs who were at risk of being seized at a "safe house" until they could be spirited out of the city. Residents were given 10 days' warning to relocate large dogs, but for many, that was not enough.

"Anxiety and outrage quickly spread among dog owners," wrote Yardley. "Several reported that police were already apprehending large dogs in apartment compounds and had even entered individual apartments to seize some dogs," reported by neighbors responding to published offers of rewards for identifying keepers of illegal dogs.

"Web sites posted photographs of dogs crammed into holding pens at dingy city pounds," Yardley continued, describing "a woman who owns several dogs and asked not to be identified for fear the police would try to seize her pets. She is building a kennel in her uncle's village in nearby Hebei province to ensure that her dogs and others are not seized."

Muzzling protest

Even if large dogs would be safe in Hebei, and if everything Xie Chuanjiao reported was authentic, Beijing officials were up against skepticism resulting from decades of hostility toward dogs, propagandizing in response to public discontent, and a continuing tendency to repress dissidents.
"Huang Yong, a 30-year-old government employee, was detained while distributing T-shirts bearing slogans such as 'Down with dog-raising restrictions' to demonstrators outside the Beijing Zoo, according to friends," reported Jane Cai of the South China Morning Post on November 21.

"At least 500 dog lovers joined the November 11 protest outside the zoo," Cai continued.

"It has been 10 days since the detention," one of Huang's friends told Cai. "Police caught and released a dozen people that day. But my friend has not been released yet."

Summarized Cai, "The friend said she had been told Mr. Huang had been detained for disturbing public order and causing a riot, and faced up to 37 days in custody. The friend said police kept asking her who was the 'plotter,' and did not believe the protest occurred spontaneously as a result of conversations in Internet chat rooms. Police also warned her not to talk to the media."

Beijing Human & Animal Environmental Education Center founder Zhang Luping told Associated Press that police closed her web site, www.ani8.com, for allegedly "leaking state secrets."

"Friends with the Beijing Public Security Bureau told me they wanted to punish the protest leaders," Zhang Luping told Cai, "who made the city lose face in international society while the 2008 Olympics host city is under the spotlight."

Reported Charles Hutzler of Associated Press, "Organizers of the protest said they had applied for a permit, but had been refused. Though the demonstration was largely peaceful, anti-riot squads in helmets and dark uniforms were dispatched, plainclothes police milled through the crowds, and large numbers of uniformed police sat in trucks down the street. Police tried to prevent reporters from taking pictures and warned protesters that they could suffer serious consequences for their actions."

Elaborated China Times, "After several protestors got on the short wall protecting the trees to chant slogans, the police began to take action. ETTV reporter Lu Bingnong was filming with a small hand-held videocamera. He was 'invited' to go into the zoo police station, where he was interrogated in a small room. He was asked to provide identification. He took out this Taiwan identity card and his reporter's card. The police were going to confiscate them, but he protested and got to keep them. The videotape was removed from his camera, and then he was permitted to leave, with the camera. Three local Beijing reporters were arrested. One of them threw a chair inside the police station."
"There will be more protests like this," software programmer Xu Chun, 25, told Calum MacLeod of USA Today. "We want the leaders to know we are not happy, and that they must revise these unreasonable rules."

"People are saying that if they have to, they will fight back," Wu Tianyu told Yardley. "I told the young people that they should not fight back. It is the order of the government. If you fight back, it will hurt the dogs in the long run."

Observed Washington Post Foreign Service correspondent Maureen Fan, "The face-off has exposed fault lines between older bureaucrats with a mandate to keep public order, and a growing middle class that no longer accepts the traditional Chinese view of dogs as dishonorable or corrupt.

"Even before the protest, sources said, officers from the Internet unit of the police began visiting operators of pet-related Web sites. Several officers showed up at the offices of Chinapet.com, which runs dozens of chat rooms, and ordered that posts containing the words 'protest' or 'gathering' be deleted," Fan wrote.

"They wanted to delete messages calling on people to be together and take to the streets to oppose the big dog ban. We could do nothing but obey," programer Zhou Hongsheng told Fan. "Normally, pets are not controversial," Zhou said.

While Internet use to organize protest was discouraged, more than 1,400 Beijing residents took part in an online forum about proper dog care hosted by the state-controlled Beijing News, featuring 11 dog experts and public officials. Excerpts from the discussion later appeared in the Beijing News print edition.

Elsewhere in China

A similar crisis over enforcement of a ban on large dogs in Hefei brought a pledge from the city zoo to house the displaced dogs. "Zoo director Jiang said there is more than 60 square metres of land at the zoo available for the dogs," China Daily reported on November 11. "The zoo will provide staff to specifically look after the dogs, free of charge to their former owners. The only thing the owners are required to do is visit their old best friend regularly, bringing dog food."

Shenzhen, meanwhile, on November 22 dropped German shepherds from a list of 28 forbidden breeds. Still on the list are Newfoundlands and Tibetan mastiffs. Shenzhen published the list on September 18, after abolishing the municipal "pet ownership fee," which had been the equivalent of $625 U.S., and cutting the annual licensing free from about $250 to approximately $37.50.

With as many as 150 million dogs now, more than 90% of whom are pets, China has just over twice as many dogs as the U.S., the runner-up. The explosive growth of pet-keeping has stimulated parallel growth in the number of veterinary practices, some of them haphazardly operated and suspected of dispensing ineffective and potentially dangerous homebrewed vaccines. A recent official assertion that about 17% of vaccinated dogs remain susceptible to rabies may hint at the extent of the problem.

Shanghai Daily reporters Yang Lifei and Zou Qi on November 20 outlined regulations taking effect on January 1, 2007 which require that veterinary clinics must be more than 100 square meters in size, "cannot be near hospitals, schools, restaurants or other crowded venues," and "must be equipped to handle disinfections, examinations and laboratory tests. In addition," Yang and Zou wrote, "each clinic must have at least two registered veterinary surgeons on staff," and must be certified in animal medical care and zoonotic disease prevention.

"Currently, there are 72 legal pet hospitals or clinics in Shanghai, but industry officials say there are far more unregistered clinics doing business in the city," Yang and Zou said.

Cat proliferation has received much less attention in China than the growing numbers of dogs.

However, reported Chinese Companion Animal Protection Network founder Jia Meng, via the Asian Animal Protection Network on November 20, the Hangzhou organization CatsZone recently successfully introduced neuter/return in response to complaints about free-roaming cats from "a residential community with the name of WuLing Garden Apartments."

CatsZone representatives convened a public meeting to explain neuter/return that was heavily covered by local news media, Jia Meng said. Seventy-three citizens signed a letter asking that neuter/return be made the official city policy.
--Merritt Clifton