Stuffed Animals

Hampshire police said around 300 officers were involved in the operation, which was led by police forces in south-east England.

Addresses in Berkshire, Surrey, Sussex, Kent, Greater London, Merseyside, Worcestershire, Lancashire, Northumbria, Yorkshire, Belgium and the Netherlands were targeted.

“The people arrested are all suspected of being involved in criminal activity associated with animal rights extremism,” a Hampshire police spokeswoman said.

“All have been taken to undisclosed police stations across the country and will be interviewed throughout the day.”

The spokeswoman said European police were cooperating with the operation. “There is ongoing police activity at the addresses, and officers are working with local communities to minimise any disruption,” she said.

The Freshfields Animal Rescue Centre, in Ince Blundell, Merseyside, was among the addresses targeted. It has been taking in unwanted animals from across the region for more than 25 years.

Merseyside police confirmed that the centre, near Formby, a coastal town 15 miles north of Liverpool, had been raided as part of today’s operation.

The FBI has previously described the UK as the global centre of animal rights extremism, and the National Extremist Crime Unit has been coordinating police investigations into criminal activity by some members of the Animal Liberation Front (ALF).

Last year, British police began a new crackdown on animal rights extremism and those who raise funds for it.

In February this year, the Guardian revealed that the operation included targeting animal rights street stalls in city centres.

Police said some stalls had been used to raise funds for criminal actions by extremists, including campaigns such as that against Huntingdon Life Sciences, Europe’s largest contract medical testing centre.

Last month, the Daily Telegraph reported that animal rights extremists had been targeting farmers at a rate of one incident every nine days. The farmers attacked were predominantly involved in processed poultry farming.

In one incident, for which the ALF claimed responsibility, around £250,000 of damage was caused to lorries in a firebomb attack on a farming business in Oxfordshire.

From http://www.buzzle.com/articles/135980.html

The Mekong delta will sweep through vast aquatic biospheres along with the river Amazon. Its depths will be home to the critically endangered Mekong giant catfish, the largest freshwater fish in the world, and rare poisonous tree frogs will inhabit the treetops of tropical forests.

That, at least, is the dream of the team behind a £375m plan to build a visitors’ center, huge aquariums for conserving rare, freshwater species and educational facilities on disused Bedfordshire claypits. But now the scheme is in jeopardy after opposition from animal rights groups.

The National Institute for Research into Aquatic Habitats (Nirah) is due to open in 2011 and could generate at least 2,000 jobs at Stewartby, near Bedford. The scheme will be four times as large as the Eden Project in Cornwall and will employ the same designer, Nicholas Grimshaw. It will include research centers for scientific study and commercial exploitation of biotechnology opportunities.

The latest architectural drawings reveal undulating translucent roofs covering pools and rivers. Surrounding the complex will be esplanades, lakes, topiary mazes and fountains.

The 250-acre site has the potential to attract 2 million visitors a year. Applications for planning permission and up to £50m of funding from the Big Lottery Fund are to be lodged shortly. Up to 20,000 species, including fish, amphibians and reptiles from some of the world’s most threatened wetland habitats will eventually be housed in Nirah’s rivers, lagoons, reefs and flooded forests.

The campaign by animal rights groups, however, has raised objections to the involvement of drug companies, proposed research into fish farming and the removal of fish from their natural environment.

One of the areas research scientists are hoping to develop is the use of natural poisons and venoms for future medical treatments, which may enable cancer drugs, for example, to target tumors more precisely and avoid damaging healthy cells.

Those behind the project are aware that comparisons have been made with Huntingdon Life Sciences, the company which uses animals for biotechnology and pharmaceutical research and has been repeatedly attacked.

“It is claimed the central purpose of Nirah is conservation,” Animal Aid says. “[But] the only true way of helping species at risk is to protect their wild habitats, as opposed to cooping them up in captivity. Not only will Nirah be an aquatic zoo, it will also … conduct research into ways of farming some of the fish and reptiles for meat in their native countries.”

Another group, the Captive Animals Protection Society, says: “We believe that zoos, including aquariums, exist primarily to serve tourists. What education can there be in seeing animals in unnatural conditions, often displaying abnormal behavior?

“Nirah have [said] that 15-20% of all species they intend to display will have been wild-caught. This could mean that thousands of individual animals are taken from their natural habitats. Currently huge numbers of animals wild-caught for aquariums do not survive the journey.

“The only details made public so far are plans to research toxins and secretions. [We] believe these experiments are invasive … we are also concerned about what will happen with these venoms and toxins; will they be tested on other animals?”

To try to forestall criticism, the project has formulated an animal rights policy. Profesor Chris Shaw, from the School of Pharmacy at Queen’s University, Belfast, says Nirah will not conduct invasive animal experiments and will establish an ethics committee.

“There are species becoming extinct each year,” he said. “A captive breeding program will stop wild specimens being taken. This will use the best of British innovation in bio-sciences. We will set up an international program so people can come and do their doctorates here.

“We are particularly interested in using molecules in snake venoms that function like cruise missiles, homing in on precise targets [in the body]. They could help deliver chemotherapy without surrounding collateral damage. Snake venom also contains valuable coagulants. The Australians are using [the chemicals] to spray on to the bleeding injuries of car crash victims to stop them losing too much blood.”

Peter May, chairman of the company financing the project, Nirah Holdings, says: “There will be no vivisection and no invasive research. There will be an ethics committee chaired by Peter Scott, a vet employed by the government to grant zoo licences. We are not going to have the problem that Huntington Life Sciences have had. We will not be dealing with marine mammals.”

Professor Shaw says Nirah will develop knowledge about captive breeding programs for fish farming. “It would be foolish for us not to look at the potential of species [such as the pacu] which can be fed on clippings off football pitches.”

The project will also establish a conservation trust to protect endangered species in the wild. The money will partially be raised through car park charges.

From http://www.buzzle.com/articles/183685.html

For those who feel that this is cruel and unjust, the very idea that someone could even consider wearing furs at all borders on the incomprehensible and is certainly an issue which is highly morally suspect. Their argument is that humankind must learn to develop a greater respect for what are after all our fellow animals, and in this way, we may come to a greater appreciation of our natural world and learn to revere and protect it more vigilantly than we now do.

Those on the other side of the argument are those who produce the furs themselves and those who wear them. For the producers, an obvious motivation is the high profit margin involved in the sale of furs, as they are very much so considered luxury (and luxurious) items. Therefore, to defend themselves they point out that, harsh though it may be, the fact is that animals which can prove themselves to be profitable actually stand a greater chance of being protected and preserved. Also, they note that human history is indeed one of using animal furs for clothing. And anyway, they say, the claims about mistreatment of fur-bearing animals are greatly exaggerated and are often simply fabrications.

Wherever you stand on this debate, you can log on to the Internet and see what both sides have to say about themselves and each other.

From http://www.buzzle.com/editorials/4-12-2001-2987.asp

Quite by coincidence yesterday I had come across an article titled ‘One Day We’ll put an End To The Breeding Of Dogs & Cats!’ by Paul Root of the California Federation of Dog Clubs Alliance of Responsible Pet Owners, Inc. This article is an outraged vent against the following statement made by Ingrid Newkirk, the co-founder of PETA along with Alex Pacheco – “The bottom line is that people don’t have the right to manipulate or breed dogs or cats. If people want toys, they should buy inanimate objects. If they want companionship, they should seek it with their own kind. One day, we will put an end to the breeding of dogs and cats.”

Well, as someone who’s lived with dogs most of my life, this statement kind of outrages me too. My dogs aren’t toys, they are companions, and we have mutually enjoyable relationships – and anyway I just don’t see who Ingrid Newkirk is to decide where and with whom I seek my company. As for putting an end to breeding, if she can stop the puppy mills, well and good, if she’s talking of putting an end to ALL breeding, please!!! It’s a wide, wide world and there are just too many dogs out there and just how is PETA going to keep an eye on the morals of every single one of them? Besides, how can you talk of Animal Rights with a straight face when you want to take away the most basic one from them?

In his article, Paul Root gives the following agenda of PETA :

1. Abolish all animal research.
2. Abolish all product testing, dissection, or demonstrations on animals.
3. Encourage “vegetarianism” for ethical, ecological, and healing reasons
4. Phase out all forms of “animal agriculture” i.e. the growing of animals for food.
5. Abolish all pesticides and any form of predator control.
6. Transfer the enforcement of animal welfare legislation from the Department of Agriculture to a new agency created for the protection of animals and the environment.
7. Abolish all trapping and fur ranching.
8. Abolish all “hunting and fishing” for sport!
9. Save the rain forests and ban all international trade in wildlife or goods produced from exotic animals.
10. Abolish all breeding of companion animals- including pedigreed or purebred dogs and cats!!!!
11. Abolish the use or association of animals in sports, entertainment, zoos, rodeos, coursing, or aquariums.
12. Prohibit the production of genetically manipulated transgenic animals.

1. Abolish all animal research – I don’t have any problem with this one. I saw a film about a Research Lab Chimpanzee, where they graphically described all the experiments that had been conducted on him – and I thought, whoa, you do that to a human being and you end up at the Nuremburg Trials. Anyone who thinks I’m being over-dramatic and insensitive here should take a look at their favorite pet and imagine such research being done on him/her. It’s easy to say, go ahead, and shut your eyes to the torment and pain involved when you personally don’t know the animal concerned. Surely, with all the modern technological developments, we can come up with some better and humane ways to treat and extend our own lives?

2. Abolish all product testing, dissection, or demonstrations on animals – more or less same opinion.

3. Encourage “vegetarianism” for ethical, ecological, and healing reasons – encourage, yes, but don’t force. Otherwise you’re being unethical and unhealing.

4. Phase out all forms of “animal agriculture” i.e. the growing of animals for food – I go with this too – I like cows and pigs and goats and sheep and rabbits and chickens and turkeys (I always wonder how anyone can have a thankful day after having just dispatched someone to their death) and geese and ducks and so on.

5. Abolish all pesticides and any form of predator control – to some extent, yes, as a gardener I try to use natural pesticides. I’m not sure what ‘abolish any form of predator control’ means – is it ‘word overkill’ or ‘word malfunctioning’? – The Forest Department here just caught a leopard that had sneaked into the neighborhood – if the meaning here is doing nothing and letting that leopard have a go at me, nope, I’m not that altruistic – I highly recommend catching the predator, as they did, and releasing it back into the wild, again as they did.

6. Transfer the enforcement of animal welfare legislation from the Department of Agriculture to a new agency created for the protection of animals and the environment – more bureaucracy? – or an effort to create more jobs?

7. Abolish all trapping and fur ranching – I personally can’t imagine raising furry goofballs and skinning them so people like Ms. Crawford don’t have to wear sweaters (I don’t have anything against shaving the sheep, by the way).

8. Abolish all “hunting and fishing” for sport! – for food I can understand, for fun, no, I can’t and don’t want to either. And people who think it’s ‘brave’ to go hunting are sick and have a screw missing. Stop reading Hemingway for inspiration. He was a good writer, but an idiot otherwise – and we know what happened to all his manly bravado in the end.

9.Save the rain forests and ban all international trade in wildlife or goods produced from exotic animals – OH YES!

10. Abolish all breeding of companion animals- including pedigreed or purebred dogs and cats – OH NO!

11. Abolish the use or association of animals in sports, entertainment, zoos, rodeos, coursing, or aquariums – as Dick Francis, one of my favorite authors said, horses like to run; since he was a jockey himself and spent a major portion of his time around horses probably he knew what he was talking about. As for entertainment and the zoo, if I were a tiger, I would rather be jumping through hoops in different cities than growing listless in one same old cage. Of course, if I had the choice, I wouldn’t have left the jungle in the first place, but you know how these humans are, they think they can decide and manage things for other species.

12. Prohibit the production of genetically manipulated transgenic animals – don’t toy around too much with Mother Nature, I say. Why do you want genetically manipulated transgenic animals anyway, when you can’t behave well enough with the existing genetically unmanipulated, non-transgenic creatures of both the four-legged and two-legged variety?

I don’t think the PETA people are totally off their rocker, but they ought to make a serious attempt to stop behaving like an intolerant cult and expecting people to toe the line – whatever the cause most people like to or should be allowed to make up their own minds. It just won’t do to forget about people’s rights in all the furore over animal rights.

From http://www.buzzle.com/editorials/12-11-2004-62796.asp