Ocean Sentry
(From ft.com)- Brussels on Wednesday proposed to outlaw trading in seal products which breach animal welfare standards. The move brought cheers from animal rights campaigners but risks triggering tensions with Canada. “Seal products coming from countries which practice cruel hunting methods must not be allowed to enter the EU,” said EU enviroment commissioner Stavros Dimas on Wednesday.
“The EU is committed to upholding high standards of animal welfare.”
“The people of Europe and the European Parliament will accept nothing less than a total ban,” said Neil Parish, a UK Conservative MEP who is president of the Euopean Parliament’s animal welfare group.
The commission said that scientists at the European Food Safety Authority believed that seals could be killed rapidly and efficiently, but that effective killing does not always take place in practice.
There have been concerns, for example, that seals are sometimes struck and then lost, resulting in suffering, and also that skinning may take place while animals remain concious.
Canada also lodged a complaint with the World Trade Organisation over Dutch and Belgian bans on seal products last year.
