As Canadian Lobbyists Attempt to Sway European Commission Not to Ban Seal Product Trade, Canadian Government Denies Journalists and Animal Welfare Groups Permits to Document Slaughter
Canada's commercial seal slaughter will begin half an hour before dawn on Friday, March 28. However, at this time, Department of Fisheries and Oceans officials have refused to confirm they will issue permits to observers to document the killing for the opening day of the hunt. The Canadian government has authorized a slaughter of 275,000 seals in 2008.
Observation of the seal hunt is a right guaranteed under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. The commercial seal hunt occurs in public space, and journalists and citizens have the right to bear witness to it and document what happens.
"This is another attempt by the DFO to cover up the cruelty of the commercial seal hunt on the eve of the European Union deciding if it will ban seal products," said Rebecca Aldworth, director of Animal Programs for Humane Society International/Canada. "Notably, observers from the European Commission were prevented from properly observing the commercial seal hunt in 2007 when they attended it with the Department of Fisheries and Oceans."
As officials deny journalists full access to the seal hunt, media accounts report a delegation of sealing industry lobbyists funded by the Canadian government is in Brussels to convince the EU not to ban the import of seal products. In 2006, the European Parliament passed a historic resolution calling on the European Commission to immediately draft legislation banning the trade in seal products, regardless of the age of the seal.
"Just two days ago we stood on the ice with baby seals almost entirely covered in white fur—tomorrow those pups will be brutally clubbed, shot and skinned. Those are the images the DFO is desperately trying to conceal from the public," said Mark Glover, Director of Humane Society International/UK.
The European Commission initiated a study on the animal welfare aspects of commercial seal hunting, the results of which should provide the foundation for a ban. That study found evidence that seals may be "skinned whilst conscious, resulting in avoidable pain, distress, fear and...suffering."
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