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Suggested letter to the Ambassador Oh Joon

Dear President of the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), His Excellency Oh Joon,

ECOSOC is one of the six main organs of the United Nations and is the principal body for coordination, policy review, policy dialogue and recommendations on economic, social and environmental issues, as well as for implementation of the internationally agreed development goals. These goals include no poverty, zero hunger, good health and well-being, quality education and responsible consumption and production.

His Excellency Oh Joon,

As part of striving to achieve these goals, we are writing to you today to ask you to please add one more very important and urgent goal to your organization’s global goals: to end the horrific cruelty of the dog and cat meat trade.

Please watch this video: https://youtu.be/_ZVQjgGb4RQ

As a South Korea national, I am sure you are very well aware of the dog and cat meat trade in your country as well as in other third world Asian countries such as China, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.

South Korea has the world’s 14th largest economy and is home to global brands such as Samsung, Hyundai, Kia, LG, SK, and Daewoo. Yet, in your country, an estimated 2.5 million dogs and thousands of cats are slaughtered and eaten each year.

Forced to endure deprivation and unimaginable torture from the moment they are born until the day they are slaughtered, dogs are imprisoned in cramped, filthy, raised cages all their lives with no protection from extreme weather. They get no water, exercise, companionship or medical care, and have never felt the ground beneath their feet. Their eardrums are often burst to prevent them from barking.

In broad daylight, often in front of other live dogs, they are electrocuted, hanged, beaten, have their throats slashed, or are boiled or burnt to death. This is a profit-driven, tax free, unregulated industry that aggressively promotes the myth that eating a dog enhances male virility and stamina. Consumption peaks during the hottest days of summer (Boknal).

Your fellow Korean citizens claim that the more a dog suffers, the better tasting its meat. So many dogs are sadistically made to experience extreme fear and suffering prior to death. Cats are frequently boiled alive to make health tonics – “600 Stray Cats Boiled Alive,” Yonhap News, 5/21/15.

The demand is so high in South Korea that 20% of the dogs eaten there are now imported from China. South Korea is the only country known to have large, intensive farming systems to supply the demand for dog meat. Read more: https://koreandogs.org/

In addition to the unspeakable cruelty perpetrated by the dog meat trade, is also a serious threat to human health and the environment. The dog farms are a hotbed for infectious diseases. Since there is no disease control, these dogs suffer from highly infectious and transmittable bacteria, virus, ectoparasites, endoparasites, and fungi. Out of 165 dogs bred at a dog farm in the Seoul area, 83 dogs(50.3%) were found to be infected with endoparasites and 23 dogs(20.2%) were found to be infected with heartworms.

Puppies suffer from malnutrition because they are fed rotting food waste (infested with pests such as rats, cockroaches, flies) after being weaned. In order to hide from the law and avoid civil complaints, most dog farms are located in remote areas where the sun is scarce, causing a vitamin D deficiency, which is necessary for bone growth.

Locked in cages for months, dogs are bored and stressed from being packed with other dogs and having to breathe in the constant stench. Stress hormones weaken their immune system and they become susceptible to hormonal diseases such as hyperadrenocorticism.

Antibiotics, antidiarrheal treatments and steroids are used to control distemper, parvovirus, various respiratory and digestive diseases, but the abuse of drugs led to an increasing tolerance against antibiotics and to the relevant health problems. In some cases, ten times the normal doses were being administered by the farmers without the supervision of a veterinarian.

Large doses of heavy metals that accumulated in the organs causing internal body malfunctions are detected in dog meat. Heavy metals are assumed to have been accumulated from eating leftover food waste and low-end feed (remains from slaughterhouses). Many serious and often life threatening diseases can be attributable to this unsanitary and inhumane dog meat industry. They include animal bites and scratches, Bubonic Plague, Camphylobacter, Cutaneous larval migrans, Giardiasis, Lyme Disease, Psittacosis, Rabies, Salmonellosis, Shigellosis, Visceral Larva Migrans, Anthrax, Bebesiosis, Brucellosis, Colibacilosis,… Read the extensive research report by KARA (Korea Animal Rights Advocates) https://koreandogs.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/KARA-Dog-Meat-Report_English-1.pdf

Please watch these videos and see what is going on inside South Korea at this moment:
South Korea’s Dangerous Health Food – Inconvenient Truth About Dog Meat 1 of 2 with English Captions: http://youtu.be/vHB3uwB9kyA

South Korea’s Dangerous Health Food – Inconvenient Truth About Dog Meat 2 of 2 with English Captions: http://youtu.be/foHCBNllT8w

There is no appropriate animal protection legislation to prevent the animal cruelty currently taking place in South Korea. As someone who believes strongly that animals should not be treated in this way, I request that your organization investigate and address this issue immediately. Please impose a sanction on the South Korean government until they strengthen the Animal Protection Law to prevent animal cruelty and to introduce basic animal protection regulations. It must also provide penalties for violations and ensure that mistreated animals can be legally seized from abusers and given immediate refuge. I request that the United Nations ECOSOC strongly urge the South Korean Government to create an enforceable law to ban the torture, killing, sale, and consumption of dogs and cats. Please don’t let the South Korean government get away with this outrageous cruelty to the companion animals. Include the End of the Dog and Cat Meat Trade to the Global Goals of the UN Economic and Social Council!

Thank you for your attention and kind consideration.