A shocking undercover video exposing Australia’s
cruel live export aired on 60 Minutes and it has us all shook.
Obtained by trainee navigator Faisal Ullah last August and
released to ABC and Animals Australia,
the footage shows sheep crammed in dirty pens, panting from heat stress, and
leaping over one another to reach food.
The footage exposes bodies of dead sheep piled up and
thrown overboard. It also shows newborn lambs, despite a federal ban on
transporting lambs and pregnant ewes on export ships to the Middle East between
May and October.
As if the conditions weren’t horrible enough, Ullah reported
crew members cutting lambs’ throats and tossing the animals overboard.
See the heartbreaking footage yourself.
This is the first time that footage from onboard an
Australian live-export ship has been captured. While industry groups, the
Department of Agriculture, and agriculture minister David Littleproud say that
conditions on the ship are shocking and unacceptable, the truth is that these
conditions are common.
Sue Foster, a livestock veterinarian and spokesperson for
Vets Against Live Export, tells
The Guardian that the crowded, filthy
conditions and extreme heat happen “every time these ships go to the Middle
East in summer.
Over the past 30 years, Australia’s live-export industry has
shipped over 200 million animals to the Middle East. During this time, more
than 2.5 million animals have died in transit and countless more have suffered injury,
illness, and distress.
These are living,
feeling beings—not cargo.
Each year, billions of cows, sheep, pigs, chickens, and fish
are violently killed for food. And despite being just as sensitive and intelligent as the dogs and cats we
know and love, farmed animals are relegated to unimaginable torment:
extreme confinement, filthy conditions, horrific mutilations, and a merciless
death.
Thankfully, each of us has the power to say no to animal
abuse by replacing inherently cruel animal products with compassionate vegan alternatives.
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