Activists and animal lovers from several cities in Montenegro organized a performance today in front of the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Water Management, in Podgorica, when they pointed out the problems of abuse, torture and killing of animals. After the performance, they sent several requests to Minister Vladimir Joković with the aim of solving those problems.
Among other things, they said that "hundreds of dogs and cats in a catastrophic condition live on the streets of Montenegro", and that every Sunday they witness at least one brutal killing, torture or abuse of animals. One activist, when she arrived at the event, said that not far from the event, she came across a package with abandoned puppies...
Activists and animal lovers also claim that individual animal shelters are "dog camps" and that "none of them work for the welfare of these animals."
As they stated, the owners have been abusing dogs with impunity for decades, horses are still used as a means of transport and drag tons and tons of weight, and the state has not had a solution for taking care of dead animals for decades.
They also reminded of the recent petition and protest letter of the Swiss Kurt Amsler, in which, after his visit to Montenegro, he stated that "abandoned, hungry, sick and killed dogs and cats are everyday on the streets of Montenegrin cities".
"Not only foreigners, but also our citizens, and worst of all, the employees of the competent institutions, know that the pictures of dogs and cats that have been abandoned, beaten, drowned, run over, poisoned, tortured, separated from their mothers at birth, thrown in tied bags in containers, the sick on the streets or in chains, absolute everyday life in absolutely all cities in Montenegro", stated the organizers of the performance.
They submitted 13 requests to the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Water Management.
As they stated in the requests, the Law on the Protection of Animal Welfare specifies the dates for the development of action plans and city shelters for abandoned and lost animals, and not even half of the municipalities in Montenegro have not fulfilled their legal obligations, which is why they demand to ensure compliance with the Law.
"In the municipalities that have established asylums for abandoned animals, numerous problems have been recorded in their functioning, which our volunteers have been documenting for months and publishing publicly on social networks and in the media. A particularly alarming example is the asylum in Berane, where dogs stay without supervision, because there is never employees on the spot, and then mysteriously disappear from the streets. There is no adequate supervision of the work of the asylum," they state, with the request to form an operational team that will audit the operations of the shelter.
They add that there are only 14 veterinary inspectors at the Montenegrin level, that the scope of work is large, and that the law should be changed, a special Service for the protection and rescue of animals should be established, or the responsibilities should be redirected from veterinary inspectors to communal inspectors.
The proposal of activists and animal lovers is to establish a faculty of veterinary medicine.
In their requests, they also ask the competent minister to unblock the process of amendments to the Act on the Protection of Animal Welfare.
"And to re-establish the work of the working group that was stopped in October 2021, in order to initiate changes to the Law in this part, and to bring the regulations into line with the situation on the ground," the requests say.
In this sense, they are also asking for changes in the regulations, in order to abolish the provision according to which the euthanasia of dogs that are not adopted within a month is allowed in shelters.
"We will not allow innocent dogs to be killed indefinitely, because the officers we pay allow owners to engage in behavior that leads to this high number of abandoned animals... and not doing their job," they said.
They also demand from the Ministry to be actively involved in education and promotion of responsible ownership and state that "huge money was distributed in previous years to projects for individuals that did not produce any long-term results but were turned into private pension shelters all over Montenegro":
"With that money, until now, enough mobile clinics for sterilization and treatment of animals, which are practiced in the world, could be bought to cover all regions, and which would sterilize a huge number of dogs and cats in the field".
While reminding that registration, i.e. chipping, is a legal obligation, they demand that mechanisms be found in order, in cooperation with local self-governments, to complete the "still unfinished registration of dogs that officially began in September 2019". They are also asking the competent department to start preparatory work on the establishment of a central base, that is, to carry out the registration of horses in Montenegro.
They also point out that Montenegro is a country where leishmania is present, but they state that there is no valid prevention:
"We demand that you form a working group to solve this, we believe, epidemic, by asking for help from experts from the Mediterranean countries that have prevented the spread of the infection through the EU mechanisms".
The Association for the Protection of Animals reminds that Montenegro is still on the "black" list of countries with rabies, although the last case of rabies in animals was recorded in 2012, and in dogs even earlier:
"To adopt a dog abroad, it is necessary to do a titer test for rabies, which costs a lot and wait several months for the dog to be ready to go. Testing is not done in Montenegro", they state, with a request to speed up the process of removing Montenegro from the list of countries unsafe from rabies.
In the requests, they also ask for information about the activities of the Council for Animals, which was formed at the Ministry headed by Joković. They also request that the procedures for complaints by citizens and NGOs in cases of abuse and torture of animals be accelerated, that the principles of health protection, both of citizens, animals and the environment, in the event of infectious diseases in animals, and in general when caring for dead animals, be respected.
Joković was also asked directly if he had the opportunity to visit any of the shelters, if he has a pet and, if he doesn't, if he would use his personal example to encourage others and adopt them.
The Community sent an invitation to the minister to schedule a meeting, in order to jointly start solving the problem. The performance, which was held today in front of the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Water Management, is the first in a series of actions that the Community started on October 4, on International Animal Rights Day, and which will end on December 10, on International Animal Rights Day, on Independence Square, in Podgorica.
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