Re: Your visit to the Mayor of Bucharest

Dear Mayor Bourque,

News spread that you are about to make an official visit to Bucharest and its mayor Mr. Traian Basescu. Whereas we are convinced that there is absolutely nothing wrong with the fact that you wish to visit Bucharest and its local authorities, we urge you to reconsider whether you really want to meet with  Mayor Basescu who has widely proven to be a politician with a dictatorial behavior. He not only disregards the most elementary basis of the internationally accepted animal protection standards but he also refuses basic democratic rights to Bucharest's citizens by publicly threatening participants of peaceful demonstrations to have them beaten up.

Although having signed an agreement with several international animal protection associations, under which Bucharest's stray dogs were to be neutered, vaccinated and either adopted by private persons or returned to the place where they had been picked up, Mr. Basescu started a mass slaughtering of the animals. Under his extermination program, the dogs are killed in the most barbaric ways, causing unbelievable pain to the animals: strangulation, clubbing, poisoning with strychnine or injecting magnesium phosphate in the animals heart without previous anaesthesia are the methods applied. In fact, the animals are tortured to death. The killing of the dogs is carried out by unskilled employees of the city's street cleaning services, lacking even the most basic knowledge or training. To justify his actions, Mr. Basescu wilfully operates with  half-truth, misinformation and figures of which he perfectly knows that they have been proven wrong, not only by recognized specialists but even by his own people. Whereas the reputed university professor Mr. Mihai Voiculescu (head of the commission in charge of monitoring the stray dog program) said, that according to his research there are some 60.000 dogs in Bucharest, Mr. Basescu operates with figures between 200.000 and 300.000. He also pretends that more than 22.000 people have been bitten, but this figure, again, has never been confirmed by Bucharest's medical authorities. Some weeks ago he caused a panic in Bucharest pretending  that rabies is spreading and that the army might have to be brought in to eliminate all stray dogs. One day later, Dr. Narcisa Mirica, director  of Bucharest's Sanitary Veterinary Office confirmed that not one single case of rabies has been detected in the capital.

Dear Mr. Bourque, we urge you to use all means at your disposal and to throw all your influence into the scales to stop the canozide in Bucharest.

Sincerely,

Alexander Willer

CANIS International

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