*WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT! *

In recent days and weeks, we have witnessed quite disturbing scenes of cruel poisoning of dogs on the streets in North Mitrovica and recently also in Gjakova.

The extremely horrifying footage of these crimes reveals an appalling lack of tolerance for street dogs by some individuals who pose a threat not only to the dogs, but to public safety in general.

So far, we have witnessed that in every case of stray dog poisoning, the victims have been the gentlest dogs and dogs that have not posed any threat to the community. Their only fault was that they were born and lived in an intolerant and dangerous community.

There are many studies that show that people who commit crimes against animals do not stop only with animal cruelty and very soon the violence is transferred to humans. Therefore, it is very important that law enforcement institutions prosecute crimes against animals not only to bring justice to animals, but also to prevent other crimes against humans as well.

Citizens should understand that killing does not reduce the number of dogs on the street, if people themselves are to blame for this situation, abandoning dogs on the street constantly and thanks to the lack of institutional commitment to improve this situation. Killing dogs exposes a dark side of our society and does not contribute at all to solving the problem, on the contrary, it makes it worse.

It is very disturbing that in 2023 such cruel actions are still being talked about and in fact the law enforcement institutions have not punished anyone for these actions so far. Animal poisoning is a punishable offense under the Criminal Code of the Republic of Kosovo, but which has not yet been implemented in practice.

Our organization will turn to the Police and the Prosecutor’s Office for these recent cases, but unfortunately the expectations are very small that the persons responsible will be identified and punished according to the legal provisions in force.