The Prague Post
Hotel booking
November 23rd, 2008
Endowment Fund     Business Listings ONLINE      Reservations      Classifieds    Subscriptions
Prague Property

Home » Archives » News

Community in animal cruelty row

Dog meat found in illegal slaughterhouse; Vietnamese eateries come under scrutiny

By Ondřej Bouda
Staff Writer, The Prague Post
July 30th, 2008 issue

VLADIMÍR WEISS/THE PRAGUE POST
While Cheb-area Vietnamese establishments face inspections, Prague food stands, such as this one, remain popular.
Who in the Czech Republic 20 years ago could have imagined eating kangaroo steak, going to a Chinese restaurant or seeing a gyros stand on every other street corner? The country’s culinary progress since the fall of communism, however, has developed a darker side, as ethnic eating habits fail to find acceptance with the rest of society.
On July 20, police discovered an illegal Vietnamese slaughterhouse in an old barn in Chvoječná near Cheb, west Bohemia. Workers from a local animal shelter alerted authorities after they began to suspect one of their clients of selling the dogs she took home to a Vientamese man. At the site, police found several freezers full of meat. “There was also a dog collar that belonged to one of the shelter dogs,” said police spokeswoman Martina Hrušková.
After a further search, a plastic bag containing the heads of a cow and a dog was discovered. “There were animal remains everywhere, and the barn stank of rotten meat,” Hrušková said. According to the police report, the woman toured animal shelters in the area and brought dogs home that she would sell for 400 Kč ($27) to a Vietnamese accomplice.
The police are currently trying to determine if the animals were mistreated before they died. “Dog consumption by itself is not illegal. We need to prove that the butchers tortured the animals. Right now, our best lead is some chickens we found there living in pitiful conditions,” Hrušková said.
This is the second such case near Cheb since the beginning of the year. In January, police officers found goat heads and animal entrails behind a Vietnamese shopping center in Svatý Kříž.
Killing and eating a dog is not a crime in the Czech Republic. “If anyone buys a dog and eats it at home, he cannot be charged. The only thing we can do is check if the dog was tortured before death and whether the slaughter was cruel,” said Josef Duben, spokesman of the National Veterinary Authority.
Gray area
Eating dog meat might not be illegal, but selling dog meat in restaurants certainly is, as dogs are not on the list of official slaughter animals. Following their findings in Chvoječná, inspectors are investigating local restaurants to see if any of the dog meat is being served to citizens masked as chicken or pork.
“[Restaurants] will need to show papers documenting the origins of their meat, and we can even send the meat for testing to see what animal it really comes from,” said Jitka Laudová, director of the regional hygiene station.
Except for imposing fines, current animal cruelty laws do not allow authorities to do much with suspects. Currently, first-time offenders are almost always let off with a warning or a small fine. Jail time only applies to people who have been fined for cruelty to animals in the past year. In addition, no one keeps a register of offenders that would facilitate punishing cruelty to animals.
Civic Democratic (ODS) MP David Šeich wants to change the situation. He has submitted an ammendment to the Criminal Code that would greatly increase the sentences judges could hand out for animal cruelty and allow first-time offenders to be jailed.
“Anyone who tortures animals is capable of torturing people too. The current law allows punishement for repeat offenders only, and by then it is often too late,” he said.
Even though the larger Criminal Code reforms include stricter punishment for animal torture, Šeich wants his proposal to be discussed as soon as possible.
“We have recently witnessed several cases of animals being tortured to death, with videos posted online, as well as illegal slaughterhouses, and our reaction must be immediate. We cannot wait until the whole Criminal Code reform goes through Parliament; that could take ages,” Šeich said.
Culture clash
Marcel Winter, chairman of the Czech Vietnamese Society, does not think the problem of selling dog meat can be solved by stricter punishment for cruelty to animals. Instead, he calls for more cultural understanding and adaptability from the Vietnamese community, which considers it normal to eat dog meat.
“When you live in a foreign country, you must adapt to the local customs,” Winter said. “Killing dogs and storing dog meat in a fridge is considered unethical in the Czech Republic and, by doing so, a few individuals endanger the peaceful co-existence of two ethnic groups,” Winter said.
He also points out that eating dog meat is not the only practice that the Vietnamese should reconsider. “You can often see Vietnamese stalls in markets selling neo-Nazi T-shirts. That borders on the self-destructive, and the stall owners should think before selling such merchandise,” Winter said.
The Vietnamese community is fairly closed and most of their customs and habits are unknown to outsiders, Winter added. An example can be their love of duck eggs with a nearly fully formed duckling inside. The eggs are cultivated almost to hatching point and then sold as a delicacy in Vietnamese markets in the Czech Republic — even though it is illegal. “Only eggs without embryos can be sold. However, it is hard to check every single egg at all markets throughout the country,” Duben said.
Winter calls on Vietnamese citizens nationwide to promote their cause by adapting. “Such behavior should stop in the interest of the whole Vietnamese minority living here,” he said.
The current public outrage over the Chvoječná case may not have been so great only a few decades ago. War veterans recall eating cats and dogs, because it was the only meat they could get their hands on. And some use dog fat as a topical rub to cure pneumonia, bronchitis and other pulmonary disorders.

Ondřej Bouda can be reached at obouda@praguepost.com


Other articles in News (30/07/2008):

Browse the Current Issue

If you enjoyed this article, why don't you subscribe to the print version!
We accept secure online transactions provided by PayPal and Moneybookers

Be the first to add a comment!


Full Name: *
City: *
E-mail: **
This comment can be published in the print version of The Prague Post
Enter the text on the right:
 visual captcha
Comment: *
* Required field. In order to be approved for display, comments must have a first and last name and a city.
** E-mails are required and will only be used for internal purposes.

Most visited in Business Listings

Hotel booking
The Prague Post Online contains a selection of articles that have been printed in
The Prague Post, a weekly newspaper published in the Czech Republic.
To subscribe to the print paper, click here.
Unauthorized reproduction is strictly prohibited.