Main opposition CHP municipalities to not implement stray animal bill if enacted

Turkish main opposition CHP Spokesperson Yücel has announced that their municipalities would not implement the bill to remove stray dogs from the streets “until they are adopted,” and to kill “aggressive” ones or the ones with untreatable diseases. Presented to the Parliament by the ruling AKP, the bill charges municipalities with getting strays off the street.

Thursday July 18 2024 02:42 pm

Duvar English

The main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) municipalities will not implement the controversial stray animal bill if it is enacted, the party’s spokesperson Deniz Yücel announced on July 17.

Presented to the Parliament by the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), the bill would charge municipalities with getting strays off the street and into shelters until they are adopted. “Aggressive” dogs or any with untreatable diseases would be killed, dubbed by the AKP as “euthanasia.”

Yücel said they are against the bill as it is, and added that no CHP municipalities would perform “euthanasia” if the Parliament passes the bill.

“It is very difficult to live in this country, both for humans and animals. The 17-article massacre bill authorizes municipalities to euthanize, in other words to kill, animals with rabies, infectious or incurable diseases, or animals whose ownership is prohibited. If the stray animal population poses a threat to public safety, healthy animals can also be euthanized (with this bill),” Yücel said.

“The right to life of stray animals is sacred and inviolable, just like us. The greatest responsibility of being human is to protect and defend the life of every living being. This is what we want to announce to everyone: No CHP municipality will accept and implement euthanasia for stray animals. We will continue to defend the right to life of stray animals until the end,” he added.

Yücel said they support all measures to be taken in sterilization, vaccination, and on-site rehabilitation of the stray animals.

The CHP holds 14 metropolitan provincial, 21 provincial, 337 district and 48 central district municipalities, surpassing the AKP in the first two categories.

Under current legislation, municipalities have to neuter and vaccinate all street dogs and leave them where they were found following treatment.

The opposition criticizes the government for not effectively implementing the current law.

The Turkish Parliament's Agriculture, Forestry, and Rural Affairs Commission on July 17 started discussing the controversial bill.

The bill alarmed animal rights advocates, who deemed it a “massacre.”