Dog meat festival in China cancelled after online outcry
A three-day dog-eating festival in China that has been practiced for the last 600 years has been banned after a wave of online outcry.
The annual festival held in Qianxi Township, Jinhua City in Zhejiang Province was cancelled after hundreds of thousands of netizens criticised it on social networking platform Weibo, news agency Xinhua reported.
A Weibo user named Junchangzai launched an online campaign to condemn the festival and his post was retweeted over 100,000 times. Photos showing encaged, skinned and butchered dogs from past festivals were posted online to garner awareness on the upcoming festival.
A survey administered by the local government reported that most local villages opposed the carnival. Junchangzai and other users also called on the government to intervene and ban the festival.
After the festival was banned, Junchangzai said, "The government's quick response should be encouraged. I hope eating dogs will not be a custom there anymore. It's not a carnival, but a massacre."
However, some villagers were unhappy with the ban. "It's our tradition, which the government has no right to ban," a villager told Xinhua.
The tradition dated back to 1389 commemorates the troops of Zhu Yuanzhang, who secretly silenced the dogs by killing them before seizing Qianxi. After the victory, soldiers feasted on the slaughtered dogs. The tradition of eating dogs is celebrated by an ancient fair that was replaced by a modern commodity fair.
See photos of the festival and other photos here.
