Dog-Meat Mafia: Inside Thailand's Smuggling Trade

[webfact]

Dog-Meat Mafia: Inside Thailand's Smuggling Trade
By Craig Skehan

BANGKOK: -- Thai authorities are struggling to stop dogs from being stolen and smuggled to northern Vietnam, where one million dogs are eaten each year.

Stray dogs and pets are being illegally snatched, bought, or even bartered for household items, then smuggled to Vietnam, where they are sold, butchered and eaten.

With bribery at border checkpoints, apathy in the transit country of Laos, and northern Vietnam’s appetite for one million dogs a year, Thai authorities are struggling to stop an estimated 200,000 dogs every year being exported alive in this international racket.

Smugglers pay helpers, often poor farmers, to comb rural areas and towns, buying dogs, grabbing strays or stealing pets.

Dogs are collected throughout the northeast of Thailand, then taken to holding pens in the provinces of Nong Khai, Bueng Kan, Nakhon Phanom and Mukdahan.

In transit, conditions for the animals are horrendous. The dogs are loaded by the hundreds onto open-sided trucks, starving and dehydrated, and stacked on top of each other, suffering from bite wounds and broken bones — some even dying en route.

Full story: http://www.theglobalmail.org/feature/dog-meat-mafia-inside-thailands-smuggling-trade/616/

-- THE GLOBAL MAIL 2013-05-20

[geronimo]

I love all animals and this is a bone of contention!

[bigbamboo]

Stealing family pets is just too scummy for words.

Bastards.

Edited May 20, 2013 by bigbamboo

[Pimay1]

A dog truck came by here two days ago. They were piled on top of each other. I'm sure some were already dead. The lady across the street sold her two year old male dog for B200. They threw him in the back of the truck and went on their way.

[Hobiecat]

They could gladly come to Hua Hin and clean out all the Soi dogs around my house. It's so bad some times I have to carry a stick walking down the road.

Oh no....I can hear the bleeding hearts already.

[chrischronic]

If you want this horrible cruelty stopped you can start by donating to these guys..

http://www.soidog.org/en/dogmeat/

[cobra1]

guess real mafia crime drugs,prostitution,guns, etc doesnt pay any more dog eat dog trade

[Suffinator]

Let's be honest do you really think Thais give a xxxx about dogs being butchered, especially when they can make money. Considering that the Thais will even stoop as low as using endangered animals to make money they certainly won't care about dogs lives if there's coin to be made.

Endangered Animals Being Exploited in Thai Tourism

Edited May 20, 2013 by metisdead

[JetsetBkk]

In transit, conditions for the animals are horrendous. The dogs are loaded by the hundreds onto open-sided trucks, starving and dehydrated, and stacked on top of each other, suffering from bite wounds and broken bones some even dying en route.

Make it legal. License companies that want to do this trade. Enforce laws concerning transportation/slaughtering of the animals.

Hang on, this is Thailand. Forget all that.

[Traveller45]

I am personally not against eating dog. What has the poor cow, the pig done wrong? Is my favourite question in that context. From what I am told, in Vietnam they elevate dogs specifically for meat, these dogs get special food and are being kept correctly. There are even hi-price restaurants specializing on dog meat. But these are stray dogs from the street, full of disease, that nobody in his right mind would want to eat. Why is everything in Thailand always so low? Viets are proud and can become rather aggressive too if their rules are violated. Here you pay your way out of everything. Is that what Buddhism does to the morality of people, as opposed to Communism...?

[Chao Lao Beach]

A dog truck came by here two days ago. They were piled on top of each other. I'm sure some were already dead. The lady across the street sold her two year old male dog for B200. They threw him in the back of the truck and went on their way.

Couldn't you sell her as well? Every time you see a dead dog on the side of the road, drop it into her front yard.

[ginjag]

out of all the posts to date the one thing missing---POLICE. if known pickps are running around local areas, everyone sees them,

Big effort to stop this is NOT just at the border posts it IS in local areas. Police take the dogs to a pound--confiscate the pick-up and heavily fine the( Bar-stewards.). stopping the collection stops the trade. UNLESS some big wig again is in the monkey---oh sorry DOG business.

[ginjag]

A dog truck came by here two days ago. They were piled on top of each other. I'm sure some were already dead. The lady across the street sold her two year old male dog for B200. They threw him in the back of the truck and went on their way.

Sounds like you live amongst nice neighbours. Just saying.

[ghworker2010]

This is so cruel and I dont even want to think about the poor conditions and cruelty that these dogs are put under. Its another example of the bad attitude of the Vietnamese people

[GAZZPA]

I am personally not against eating dog. What has the poor cow, the pig done wrong? Is my favourite question in that context. From what I am told, in Vietnam they elevate dogs specifically for meat, these dogs get special food and are being kept correctly. There are even hi-price restaurants specializing on dog meat. But these are stray dogs from the street, full of disease, that nobody in his right mind would want to eat. Why is everything in Thailand always so low? Viets are proud and can become rather aggressive too if their rules are violated. Here you pay your way out of everything. Is that what Buddhism does to the morality of people, as opposed to Communism...?

From my experience Communism does nothing for morality either. Did you see the tragic story in Beijing of the young 3 year old girl who got run over by a car and 15 people walked around her as she lay crying and bleeding in the road? She got run over for a second time and sadly died,, totally avoidable and terribly tragic. One of the interviewed locals said "we have all lost our moral compass". In my experience of living and working in China for some years communism teaches you to keep yourself to yourself and not get involved in anything that doesn't concern you. I think Thai people treat each other and foreigners with respect (if you show them appropriate courtesy as a guest) and they have a clear moral standing, it's simply that there are poor people in this developing country and when money is tight people come first.

[recycler]

Can anybody provide a phone number, would love to see our street cleaned out from stray dogs!

[Sydebolle]

They could gladly come to Hua Hin and clean out all the Soi dogs around my house. It's so bad some times I have to carry a stick walking down the road.

Oh no....I can hear the bleeding hearts already.

... and once they finished in Hua Hin please send them to the Dark Side of Pattaya. A free beer and a Somtam is also waiting for them!

[ginjag]

Can anybody provide a phone number, would love to see our street cleaned out from stray dogs!

A big number of these dogs are NOT strays in many areas, they are locally owned and are left to scavenge. Get a collecter to pick up the owners and have them put down. Dogs in the street are a headache, local authorities should sterilize the animals/ and police to take action against owners---like make it law to register all dogs locally.

[RogueLeader]

They could gladly come to Hua Hin and clean out all the Soi dogs around my house. It's so bad some times I have to carry a stick walking down the road.

Oh no....I can hear the bleeding hearts already.

ITT: Fake machismo.

Cruelty to animals is the lowest form of cowardice.

[ginjag]

They could gladly come to Hua Hin and clean out all the Soi dogs around my house. It's so bad some times I have to carry a stick walking down the road.

Oh no....I can hear the bleeding hearts already.

If it's that bad get a condo??? no dogs--and the book in your name---killing 2 birds with 1 stone----Yes your right it's NOT my business.

[kamahele]

For those who are sick of the soi dog problem in Thailand and wish that dog hunters would come to their community and take all of them away, dogs are not the problem, people are. These dogs didn't just wander into the community, the people in your community adopted them and turned them loose without medical care or proper food. Even if you don't have an issue with eating dog, very often (or all of the time) a large percentage of the dogs don't survive the trip to their destination suffocating during the trip. Then when it is time for slaughter, all too often they are skinned alive as there is a belief that this makes the meat more tender. A horrific end for an animal that was domesticated to be a companion for people. How can anyone agree that any animal should be treated like this?

[mikebell]

I love dogs - but I couldn't eat a full one. Send the Mafia round here - I'd pay them to take most of the local dogs away.

[zyphodb]

Iv'e been in Issan for one & a half years & never seen any vans coming around & grabbing the Dogs, there are so many scabby strays around that will bite you as soon as look at you, (so you have to go to the local hospital & pay anything up to 3000 Bhts for your anti-rabies course) I think that the goverment should pay dog catchers to catch any dog without a collar & sell them to Vietnam, they are a menace.....

[Beetlejuice]

Down my way it would be suicide to try and venture out at night on foot, because the packs of Soi dogs will attack passers by. Even on motorbike I have often had to risk life and limb by having to speed along at full throttle being pursued by packs of dogs aiming for my legs, some quite big, including Rottweiler mix breed of dogs, and have arrived home with my heart pounding. The so-called owners claim that these dogs live on their land, are fed by them, but they are only caring for the stray dogs out of good will. Or in other words, these morons take no responsibility for the antics of their dogs.

My dogs have never been or are allowed off the confines of our land. I know that if my dogs were ever to escape, it would be certain death for them out there, plus my dogs are considered as a part of our family, their welfare means a lot to us. Most of my neighbors dogs seem to disappear every couple of years. They have litters of puppies; the adults die of neglect or disappear, replaced by the puppies and continue on like a vicious circle over periods of time.

These people are not caring towards their dogs, and are considered more as part of the scenery rather than as family pets. So with this attitude, it is no wonder that the dog meat racketeers have a free hand to commit this sort of brutal and cruel business virtually without any hindrances from the authorities.

The only solutions to be able to curb these traders in cruelty and death, is for the authorities to encourage, impose and enforce laws on neutering, controlling and the educating of guidelines for the proper caring of their pets.

[ginjag]

For those who are sick of the soi dog problem in Thailand and wish that dog hunters would come to their community and take all of them away, dogs are not the problem, people are. These dogs didn't just wander into the community, the people in your community adopted them and turned them loose without medical care or proper food. Even if you don't have an issue with eating dog, very often (or all of the time) a large percentage of the dogs don't survive the trip to their destination suffocating during the trip. Then when it is time for slaughter, all too often they are skinned alive as there is a belief that this makes the meat more tender. A horrific end for an animal that was domesticated to be a companion for people. How can anyone agree that any animal should be treated like this?

As you see the heartless non thinking posters are posting.

Thai dogs HATE farrangs intruding into their way of life on the streets---how dare farrangs tell us THAI's to be exterminated, half of them here on an extended drinking holiday---

[upena]

Go to Sakon Nakhon. Dog meat is sold at all the markets

[ratcatcher]

They could gladly come to Hua Hin and clean out all the Soi dogs around my house. It's so bad some times I have to carry a stick walking down the road.

Oh no....I can hear the bleeding hearts already.

... and once they finished in Hua Hin please send them to the Dark Side of Pattaya. A free beer and a Somtam is also waiting for them!

Once again the stray dog problem has surfaced, and maybe that's a good thing.

As a dog owner, I might be expected to be offended by comments such as these. However, I am in total agreement.

The stray dogs in cities and towns all over Thailand need to be rounded up, neutered and if sick, humanely dispatched. Thai people think that it's OK to take unwanted pets to the local Wat where they leave them to the kindness of the monks.

it seems the biggest problem is the inhumane way the dog traders transport these animals, but then some people regard animals in the same way a builder looks at a pile of bricks.

Several posters have mentioned having mandatory spay/neutering for dog owners and their pets.

Trouble is anything mandatory in this country becomes nothing more than optional. Fines and confiscations don't work.

As for the Vietnamese consumers, I cannot complain if they like dog meat as I am partial to a nice leg of lamb on occasion.

The Viets are not much different from the Thais when transporting livestock.

[seajae]

I listen to dogs barking ,howling all night, within a few hundred metres of our house I can count 30 to 40 scummy looking dogs that live on the streets. Even the pets are not taken care of, they stink and are covered in sores, they are bred constantly in the hope of selling the pups(making money) but most end up on the streets. There is no licencing laws here, in Australia you are only allowed a couple of dogs per house unless you are a licensed breeder and all dogs over 6 months need to be registered. If your dog is found wandering in the streets you are fined, if it attacks people you cop a huge fine and the dog is put down, they have to be on leashes outside the properties and if they bark too much you also are fined(you also have to remove/pick up their crap from the public areas if you take them outside your property), in other words you are held responsible for your pets. That does not apply here, I have had many dogs over the years and I like dogs but what we have in Thailand is bullshit, unless the govt does something about it or make people responsible this to me is one way of controlling them all, either that or they start to catch and destroy any strays on the streets.

Edited May 20, 2013 by seajae

[CqK]

I am personally not against eating dog. What has the poor cow, the pig done wrong? Is my favourite question in that context. From what I am told, in Vietnam they elevate dogs specifically for meat, these dogs get special food and are being kept correctly. There are even hi-price restaurants specializing on dog meat. But these are stray dogs from the street, full of disease, that nobody in his right mind would want to eat. Why is everything in Thailand always so low? Viets are proud and can become rather aggressive too if their rules are violated. Here you pay your way out of everything. Is that what Buddhism does to the morality of people, as opposed to Communism...?

The million dollar question.

In my opinion, however, with the exception of the forest monastaries, there is no Buddhism in Thailand. The country's religion is animism disquised in saffron robes.

I've seen the pick-up trucks loaded with terrified dogs parked in front of the local police station while the truck driver eats his noodle soup at a shop near the same police station.

[davidmann]

it does not stop with dogs, maybe some tourist should see this side of thailand ,then maybe it will be stopped ,but only maybe