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Somewhere in Indonesia, home of the largest Muslim population in the world, people will be having this poor dog for dinner. Knocked out with a club and blowtorched ALIVE, hundreds of thousands of dogs and cats are being cruelly slaughtered for meat in Indonesian markets. Remember when former president Barack Hussein Obama said he ate dog meat as a child? This is the country in which he did it.
Indonesia, with the largest (approx. 202 million) Muslim population of any country in the world, has open food markets where dogs and other animals are strangled by rope, then charred, so customers can purchase whole flame-roasted animals, with agonizing expressions still etched onto their faces.
According to the New York Times, many Muslims, who make up the overwhelming majority of Indonesians, tend to regard dog meat as unclean, though Islamic tradition does not forbid the eating of it outright, as it does pork. In fact, animal rights advocates say the practice of eating dog meat seems to be thriving in Muslim areas.
The Indonesian government does not collect data on how many dogs are killed for food or consumed each year. That is because dogs are not classified as livestock, the way cows, pigs and chickens are. Because of this, the slaughter, distribution, sale and consumption of dogs are not regulated.
UK Daily Mail (h/t Susan K) The overpowering stench of charred skin wafts through the ‘meat section’ of Tomohon market, on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi. As flies buzz around the carcasses of dogs, cats, pigs and snakes which are strewn across the blood-stained floor, two teenage girls pick out the dog they want for dinner.
The emaciated dogs cower from the lasso of a slaughterhouse worker who reaches into the metal cage they have been trapped in for days – without food or water. Their eyes widen with fear as he yanks another pup out by its neck and clubs it over the head until it lies motionless on the ground.
This dog was among the ‘hundreds of thousands’ of strays and pets which are inhumanely slaughtered every year to supply Indonesia’s dog meat trade, animal protection groups claim.
The dog looks dead but dreadful footage, shot only this week, shows the animal frantically kicking out as the market worker fires up a blowtorch and burns it to death.
The heartbreaking videos, and equally disturbing photographs, were taken by Rupert Imhoff, a research officer at the Bob Irwin Wildlife and Conservation Foundation, who flew to northern Sulawesi after he heard that dogs were being beaten and burned to death.
He saw other domestic animals such as cats and rabbits – as well as wild bats, jungle rats, pigs and snakes – suffering the same gruesome fate. MailOnline has even seen disturbing footage which shows market workers cutting open a cat which had two unborn kittens inside.
Many of the dogs who end up in slaughterhouses are strays and pets. Dog snatchers on motorbikes lasso them around the neck and speed off, animal rights groups have claimed.
Some dogs are captured while their owners are walking them, and a rare few are bought from poor villagers for ‘a few dollars’. Many Indonesian street dogs are accustomed to people, who feed them regularly, and do not run away from dog snatchers.
They are then tied up and crammed into wire cages which are transported to Tomohon under cover of darkness, before the market opens at 6am. Hunters often tie the dogs legs up behind their backs – which can dislocate their shoulders – and bind their mouths shut so they cannot bite.
The animals Rupert saw were visibly distressed when they arrived at the slaughterhouse at around dawn, and many looked in dire need of food and water. One by one, they were lassoed around the neck, dragged out of the cage and clubbed over the head while they dangled from their necks in mid-air.
With the other dogs watching in terror, the slaughterhouse worker threw the animal to the ground and torched it.
Rupert noticed some of the dogs writhing frantically as they flames scorched their bodies, but found it hard to say whether it was because they were alive or whether it was their corpse’s reaction to the intense heat.
A local trader told him they are often alive – but unconscious – when they are burned alive. The exact number of dogs and cats in the country’s meat trade is unclear but the Jakarta Aid Network claims more than 200,000 are slaughtered every year.
Rupert, who has spent years investigating and exposing animal cruelty around the world, described the slaughter as the one of the ‘most violent acts’ he has ever witnessed. ‘There was a complete lack of empathy and compassion towards the animals.
‘They would scream in terror as the trader lassoed it inside the cage and continued screaming until the moment they’re clubbed unconscious.
‘Dogs are socially intelligent animals that crave companionship so it was disturbing to see meat traders killing the chosen ones in full view of still-caged animals metres away.’
WARNING: GRAPHIC FOOTAGE