Baghdad kills 58,000 stray dogs in 3-month span

[eternalflame]

Source: Associated Press

BAGHDAD — Teams of veterinarians and police shooters have killed some 58,000 stray dogs in and around the Iraqi capital over the past three months as part of a campaign to curb an increasing number of strays blamed for attacks on residents.

The Baghdad provincial government said in a statement released Sunday that 20 teams have been moving around Baghdad and the outer-lying districts daily looking for and putting down the dogs. The operation, which was first announced in late 2008, only truly took off this April after funds were allocated for the project.

The surge in strays — estimated by provincial officials to number around 1.25 million — is ironically linked to what officials say is an improvement in some elements of daily life in Baghdad, a city that for seven years has been struggling to return to normalcy after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion to topple Saddam Hussein.

Officials with the provincial veterinary directorate said that with open-air markets and bustling city life returning, the dogs are able to find more food and are having bigger litters.


Read more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38178898/ns/world_news-mideastn_africa/?GT1=43001

---

Heart breaking

[Ozymanithrax]

1. In a war ravaged city, dogs go feral and become a danger to the residents.

They do what they have to do.

[Oregone]

2. But they can make good food

[TheMadMonk]

9. Not to a Muslim. Unclean. /nt

[kestrel91316]

3. Cities don't have to be ravaged by war to have major problems with

feral dogs and cats. Just look at American cities before we had so many rabies control laws and city animal services departments.

Heck, nobody even tries to tackle our out of control feral CAT problem in Los Angeles. And they didn't when the city was rolling in dough, either.

People only start caring about these sorts of things when children die of rabies or animal attacks.

[wordpix]

4. that's so sad but we have a lot of kill "shelters" in the US, too

Spay/neuter the dogs/cats

[greiner3]

5. The killing of the dogs in Iraq;

Is not surprising for 2 reasons.

The present fear of rabies.

Dogs are considered unclean animals and have little or no use to a Muslim.

[Robb]

8. As food.

Islam considers dogs "unclean" in that they cannot be eaten. Islamic literature is quite generous to animals, in that they, like all of nature, praise the name of Allah in their own ways.

Many devout Muslims keep working dogs.

[formercia]

6. No more dead to feed on

so, now the dogs go after live game.

It reads like some post-Apocalyptic tome.

[Imajika]

7. This is not unique to Iraq at all...

It is also a common problem in cities like Bangkok. Soi Dogs (street dogs) everywhere - mostly feeding off leftover street vendor food. They are literally all over the place.

Once in awhile the government will send kill squads out to thin the numbers.

[Chulanowa]

10. Rabies is a big threat in the Middle East and South Asia

India has several hundred rabies cases a year, almost all from feral dogs. The problem is no better in the Middle East nations. Rabies is almost at epidemic levels in some places. So while on one hand, i've never liked the idea of kill squads out killing the animals, I'm willing to acknowledge the necessity.

[Hardrada]

11. They did this in Istanbul when it was still Constantinople in the 19th Century.

Abdul Hamid or one of the other later sultans had all the city's dogs (who had roamed for centuries) put on a bare island. No more stray dogs.

[wmbrew0206]

12. Unfortauntly there is no sterilization in Iraq for dogs and over breeding is a problem.

Iraqis have a lot of dogs for herding reasons and there is no process for sterilizing them. This has led to a large population of unneeded dogs. The simple solution for the Iraqis is to just shoot them which is very unfortunate.

There have been numerous cases where US military members have adopted these stray dogs or puppies and raised them as pets. It is currently becoming a moral issue due to the number of soldiers who want to take these dogs back to America with them and face multiple hurdles in being able to do so. The good news is that it is happening so often that a process is being put in place to facilitate the import of adoption Iraqi dogs to the US as their adopted units return home.

[timo]

27. H1bK9

iraqi dogs taking homes and masters away from American dogs.............................kidding only kidding

[Hubert Flottz]

13. Your tax dollars at work...

[sulphurdunn]

14. Takng up with humans

is the biggest mistake dogs ever made.

[kpete]

15. Baghdad kills 58,000 stray dogs in 3-month span

Source: Salon

Baghdad kills 58,000 stray dogs in 3-month span
Teams of vets and police have put down dogs in order to curb attacks on residents

Teams of veterinarians and police shooters have killed some 58,000 stray dogs in and around the Iraqi capital over the past three months as part of a campaign to curb an increasing number of strays blamed for attacks on residents.

The Baghdad provincial government said in a statement released Sunday that 20 teams have been moving around Baghdad and the outer-lying districts daily looking for and putting down the dogs. The operation, which was first announced in late 2008, only truly took off this April after funds were allocated for the project.

The surge in strays -- estimated by provincial officials to number around 1.25 million -- is ironically linked to what officials say is an improvement in some elements of daily life in Baghdad, a city that for seven years has been struggling to return to normalcy after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion to topple Saddam Hussein.

Officials with the provincial veterinary directorate said that with open-air markets and bustling city life returning, the dogs are able to find more food and are having bigger litters.



Read more: http://www.salon.com/news/iraq/index.html?story=/news/feature/2010/07/12/ml_iraq_stray_dogs

---

...but saddam was a very very bad man, kp

[JCMach1]

16. Overpopulation, rabies and disease...

= very bad situation :(

[benddem]

17. women I knew

who lived in Saudi Arabia in the 70's said they had to carry bags of rocks to throw at the wild dogs when they were outside. The Saudi govt. handled the problem the same way. The feral dog problem in that part of the world is terrible.

[NoNothing]

18. Yes, Saddam was bad

Was that meant to be sarcasm? Because frankly I find ethnic cleansing and murder of humans to be in an entirely different moral universe than the euthanization of dogs.

[kpete]

19. i am rarely sarcastic

it came from the same place of despair that I have had for ALL earth's creatures -
when I think about human's inability to evolve away from slaughter...kp

[TBF]

20. I don't.

The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated" ~Gandhi (1869-1948)

[NoNothing]

22. Unsourced, that one

Then again, even if factual, Gandhi had some strange ideas:

"Hitler killed five million Jews. It is the greatest crime of our time. But the Jews should have offered themselves to the butcher's knife. They should have thrown themselves into the sea from cliffs. As it is, they succumbed anyway in their millions."

[TBF]

25. Context helps -

you left out this part: The Life of Mahatma Gandhi (1950) by Louis Fischer. The quote is in the the context of Gandhi's argument to his biographer that collective suicide would have been a heroic response that would have "aroused the world and the people of Germany to Hitler's violence".

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Mohandas_Karamchand_Gandhi

Enjoy your stay.

[Brooklyns_Finest]

32. "Enjoy your stay"

What does that comment even mean? I am assuming that because the poster had a "low" post count < 1000, then he/she is a troll in your mind? Funny, that poster has been here since 2004 and you (like me) have been here since 2008.

[Recursion]

21. How many rats get killed in the US every year?

A lot of people in the middle east look at dogs as pests rather than pets (I've been asked in Kuwait, "Ewww... why are you touching that dog?")

Then again I've also had pet rats.

[Flipper999]

23. Aw, damn

I understand why they are doing this. I won't really condemn it, but... that dog in the photo looks a lot like mine. So... dang.

:(

[Lucky Luciano]

24. Arabs have extreme hatred for dogs.

They consider all dogs to be disgusting anmals on par with cockroaches and sewer rats. Many feral dogs can be quite dirty and many are probably feral, but Arabs hate clean pet dogs too...

A HUGE insult in Arab countries to call someone a dog.

[Diclotican]

26. Lucky Luciano

Lucky Luciano

On the other hand, they sees to love cats, and they have a whole form of respect for cats that dogs have not.. It can maybe be becouse the profet as muslims say he is had cats himself.. And he had a real foundness for the dam cats also.. And it is difficult to say that a cat are not usefull, as they have the habit of killing of rats mouses and other rodans, who can be some of a handfull for us humans.. And I know that dogs have a lot of important duties and is absolutely usefull for us in so many ways... Even tho im myself are more of a cat lover than a dog lover.. I like the distinkt personality of a cat... They know for the most part what they want - and how to get it... A dog have a whole different aproatch to it all..


Its sad that dogs are killed this way, some say they are at least killed humane, i doubt it.. Araba dosen't excactly love their dogs, and at least treat them with contempt if they had to come near them.. But for the most part, this is a culture fenomen.. And sometimes we all have to accept the reality that not everyone love their dogs as we do.. In fact some dosen't like dogs at all.. As some dosen't excactly love cats either.. I would say that is strange as a cat lover myself.. But some is in fact not found of cats at all... And some are not found of dogs.

Diclotican

[louis-t]

28. Arabs do NOT have an "extreme hatred" for dogs.

Jeez, talk about generalizing. People in Arabic or Middle Eastern countries generally do not have animals in their homes. Their custom is that they don't share their homes with animals. It doesn't mean they "hate" dogs or don't have dogs. I am of Arabic descent, and I find it disgusting that people have animals in their homes. My brothers, however, both have or have had cats. We were not raised with animals. I don't like the smell, I don't have time or money to care for animals. I'd rather spend the money on a kid.

I don't like the attitude of some pet owners. I have pet owners who walk their dogs down my (private) street. They look around to see if anyone is watching so they can let their dog go where he wants (rarely do they bring anything to clean it up). If they see me, they keep going to the school down the street. I have seen people drive up to the school in the dead of winter, open the door for the dog so he can shit on the parking lot, then drive off. If I catch someone letting their dog go on my grass and ask them not to do that, they get mad at me. It's usually "I was gunna clean it up". I've had people tell me "that's not your property, that's an easement" or "So you're spying on me?". Only in very rare cases have I had someone calmly say "OK, I'm sorry." I had one lady say "Oh, it's OK, I know your neighbor". I said "Oh, so he gave you permission to bring your dog over to shit on his lawn?"

I resent the attitude of some (OK, I'll say it - most) pet owners that think the world is their doggie's toilet. And "cleaning it up" is not the point. It is extremely rude to bring your animal to someone else's property and leave a mess. It's just plain laziness. Hey, YOUR dog, YOUR mess, NOT my problem.

I have no idea what a 'feral' dog is, but to me there is no such thing as a 'clean' dog or cat. I don't care how many fewer germs they have, I don't care if they're "cleaner than humans", I don't care if they spend the entire day licking themselves clean, they're animals. Given a choice between taking care of pets or people, I choose people.

Thanks for letting me rant on my birthday.

[Lucky Luciano]

29. LOL! I rest my case! Happy birthday. nt

[louis-t]

30. Ha! I knew you were gunna say that.

Giggety.

[Lucky Luciano]

31. Ohhllll-right!! nt