09/01/14 Dogs and Cats on the Island of Vis
CITY OFVIS
Attn. Mr. Ivo Radica, mayor
Trg 30. svibnja 1992., no. 2
21480 Vis
August 28, 2014
Dear Mr. Radica,
We write to you on behalf of the Animal Friends organization regarding many numerous complaints made by concerned citizens and animal protection associations regarding the majority of cats and dogs on the island of Vis, which survive and are destroyed there under brutal conditions.
Therefore, legal regulations and provision such as the program of spaying/neutering, animal-sheltering and education are not being implemented.
Horrified citizens and tourists report that the local population "resolves" the issue of city-cat overpopulation through their killing. Such primitive and barbaric practice is consequently unacceptable and is furthermore violation of the Animal Protection Act (Official Gazette "Narodne novine" 135/06) which specifically prohibits the killing of animals and inflicting pain and suffering.
Moreover, the torturing and killing of animals is a criminal offence, punishable with a prison sentence of up to one year, or a two-year prison sentence for a person committing the criminal offence by a self-interested indulgence of the act.
Article 5 of the Animal Protection Act prohibits animal abandonment.
Since abandoned animals are left out in the heat and cold, are hungry, thirsty, die in traffic accidents and killed by their abusers, then cat and dog abandonment is also considered a form of animal abuse and is punishable by a fine of up to HRK 15,000.
You are probably aware that the Animal Protection Act requires that shelter formation and operation be financed by units of local and regional government.
Vis and Split do not have a shelter for abandoned animals, which is a clear violation of the Act, resulting primarily in the death of animals which are not themselves culpable for the inaction of those irresponsible citizens who do not obtain their neutering or care for them adequately.
Although the responsibility is borne by the citizens of Vis alone, it is also the legal duty of the local community to implement legal regulations, i.e. to treat abandoned animals in a responsible manner.
Effective research, through year-long control-programs have shown that the only method able to control animal-populations and to prevent their reproduction is by spaying/neutering, giving evident long-term results.
We believe that you, as a Mayor of Vis, do not intend lowering the tourism potential of both the city and island with the networked-images of mutilated, starving, animal corpses, but to instead demonstate that you obey the laws by; promoting neutering/spaying, animal housing and the provision of sufficient amounts of food for animals which through social negligence and lack of civic provision are on the streets instead, though not by the animals own design.
As an umbrella organization co-ordinating the work of all associations in the Network Against Animal Abandoning, we offer you co-operation in the achievement of our common goals: implementing the Animal Protection Act and other positive regulations related to animal protection and health, initiating neutering and housing actions, promoting animal protection and the education of citizens, united for the purpose of improving the living conditions of island animals and the civic response to them and their treatment.
We are at your disposal for all questions and additional information.
Kindly inform us as to what you intend doing so that we can then inform members of the interested public.
Sincerely yours,
Luka Oman
President of Animal Friends
