PETA activists bare breasts in Paris against use of cows' milk
PARIS (Reuters) - Four animal rights activists bared their breasts in central Paris on Friday ahead of Mothers' Day to encourage people to wean themselves off milk.
With slogans such as "Milk = cruelty" and "Not your mother, not your milk" painted on their upper bodies, the PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) activists aimed to draw attention to the suffering of cows, whose calves are taken away at birth so that they can produce milk for dairy farms.
"On Mothers' Day (Sunday) we want to remind people that tearing calves away from their mothers causes terrible suffering," PETA France spokeswoman Marie-Morgane Jeanneau said on Place de la Nation in Paris.
PETA says there is no need to drink cows' milk as there are many plant-based alternatives.
Marie-Therese Bonneau of the National Milk Producers' Federation said that while she could understand the practice of separating calves from the cows shortly after birth can bother some people, farmers take care of the calves.
"The wellbeing of our animals is important to us" she said.
(Reporting by Clotaire Achi and Geert De Clercq; Editing by Angus MacSwan)
