The NoToDogMeat charity has uncovered a series of hidden puppy and dog farms, where adorable pups are sold to be slaughtered for meat at this week’s Yulin Dog Meat Festival.
In images revealed by the charity today, Qin Xi Zhao, who is leading the NoToDogMeat team, can be seen viewing tiny dogs who look like the iconic Andrex puppy, and being asked how much he is prepared to pay to save them.
Ahead of the Yulin Dog Meat Festival, which begins on June 21, the charity has found that around the countryside in Guangxi province en route to Yulin is a series of well-concealed puppy and dog farms.
The illegal farms are where traders supply the desire to eat dogs all year round in this sprawling city.
Qin Xi Zhao, who runs the NoToDogMeat shelter in Hebei, and is working to gather intelligence for the charity’s report to the United Nations on the issue, said: “In 2021 we uncovered so many atrocities that contradicted what the ‘party’ line is when they say there are no dog farms in China.
“Of course, they would have to say that because otherwise, they are breaching their own agricultural code, which confirms that dogs and cats should not be considered livestock.
“For too long, Beijing abetted by the West speaks of Yulin as some backward city in a forgotten province with some cultural festival of feasting on dogs once a year and drinking Lychee wine to celebrate the summer solstice, but this just isn’t the case.
“Guangxi province is massacring the innocent.”
The NoToDogMeat charity has been in Yulin for a week, trawling the well-known Qiaonon, Chengnan and Dongkou Markets, observing small vans pull up with dead dogs and watching the male and female traders cut them up, smoking and laughing as motorbikes wiz through.
At brave campaigners patrol downtown watching as revellers choose their favourite dog meat dish.
London lawyer Julia de Cadenet, who founded the NoToDogMeat charity in 2009 after witnessing the slaughter for herself, said: “The dog meat trade is still thriving in Guangxi province and is unlikely to stop anytime soon.
“Traders even complain their livelihood is being interfered with by animal rights groups, but selling dogs for as high as 1800 RMB a pop is just what they are doing with all this black market money they are getting.
“Mr Zhao, who has devoted his life to caring for dog and cat meat trade survivors, feels depressed at all he has seen, but he is relentlessly tracking down where the live dogs are and running intel on where the trucks will be coming in from next week.”
“He knew it was not just from Henan or Xi’an or Hebei that dog dealers trade. On his hunch, he has once again managed to uncover a dog farm.”
The farm uncovered by Mr Zhao specialises in puppies who are barely three months old.
The tiny dogs languish in cramped cages with no visible water and food in the boiling heat. The dead ones are stuffed in a bag, their fur removed by blowtorch and sold as meat for soup. If they survive, they are shipped to markets where they are publicly slaughtered.
This is illegal and contravenes a government statement that ‘there is no public slaughter at Yulin’. The charity has already found evidence that live slaughter is being set up for the start of the festival.
The puppy trader demanded 300 RMB per tiny pup and said if Mr Zhao bought a big bag, he would take him to the big dog farm. The charity dispatch says that all the pups are riddled with worms and infections.
Julia added: “Despite our team being Chinese, the locals are suspicious and unfriendly, but our brave activists, tears mingling with the sweat from the heat, continue to take footage and wear their NoToDogMeat shirts in a silent act of defiance against this brutality.
“The weather is sultry, and it feels like the sky could cave in, and fires will sweep through the shrublands.
“We left with our purchase knowing we can’t take them all and reach out to local groups for help to provide sanctuary.
“In a week, disaster tourists will land to take shock horror photos of the event, and large organisations will ‘ claim’ rescues and make lip service to change.
“But until the government implements its own ‘rules’ nothing will change.”
To donate to NoToDogMeat’s rescue efforts go to https://www.totalgiving.co.uk/appeal/Yulin2023
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Most people in the world are huge animal lovers (esp. dogs who represent loyalty, unconditional love and a willingness to protect their masters with their life). Most people would be shocked and angered that there are people who torture and eat these beloved innocents. As distasteful as it is to even think about this horror, we must expose this barbaric practice and make it known it to the civilized world. It must not stay hidden and unchallenged!
I hope there is a special place in Hell for people who hurt animals