odds ’n’ ends
SAN FRANCISCO:
A Chihuahua is in animal custody after leading police on a chase across the Oakland-San Francisco Bay Bridge.
The California Highway Patrol tweeted the small black dog “led us on quite a chase” Sunday and posted a video of it running furiously on the upper level of the bridge while being trailed by a motorcycle officer.
After it was captured, the Chihuahua was taken to a San Francisco animal shelter where staff members named it Ponch, after the CHP Officer Frank Poncherello played by Erik Estrada in the TV series “Chips.”
A spokeswoman for the city’s Department of Animal Care and Control said the dog wore a tag decorated with a human skull, but it had no identification. Deb Campbell said the dog was recovering from its misadventure. BEIJING:
Animal rights activists are seeking to shut down an annual summer dog meat festival in southern China blamed for blackening the country’s international reputation as well as fueling extreme cruelty to canines and unhygienic food handling practices.
Activists from a coalition of groups said Monday that they will continue press for the festival to be banned as well as legislation outlawing the slaughtering of dogs and cats and the consumption of their meat.
While an estimated 10-20 million dogs are killed for their meat each year in China, the June 20 event in the city of Yulin has come to symbolize the cruelty and lack of hygiene associated with the largely unregulated industry.
Yu Hongmei, director of the V Shine Animal Protection Association, said China needs to follow the example of the vast majority of developed nations that have banned eating dog and cat.
“China needs to progress with the times,” Yu said. “Preventing cruelty to animals is the sign of a mature, civilized society.”
Restaurant owners say eating dog meat is traditional during the summer, while opponents say the festival that began in 2010 has no cultural value and was merely invented to drum up business. Since 2014, the local government has sought to disassociate itself from the event, forbidding its employees from attending and limiting its size by shutting down some dog markets and slaughter houses.
Still, as many as 10,000 dogs, many of them stolen pets still wearing their collars, are slaughtered for the festival held deep inside the poor, largely rural Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.
Some are trucked in hundreds of kilometers (miles) stuffed six or seven to a crate or small metal cage without food or water. Slaughtering takes place in front of the animals, usually with a club to induce the pain and fear that restaurant owners claim makes their adrenaline-rich meat tastier.