ISLAMABAD:Pakistan will mark International Animal Rights Day (IARD) on Saturday by raising awareness about animals’ rights, and persuading people to extend kindness and respect to all sentient creatures.
Various departments, both public and private, especially animal rights organizations and activists will highlight the importance of the day while print and electronic media will disseminate massages regarding the IARD’s significance.
“We need to sensitize our youth and create awareness through digital and traditional media about the importance of animal’s rights and protection of their natural habitat for safeguarding this planet and environment,” noted Environment Activist and President Sustainable Tourism Foundation, Pakistan Rana Aftab while talking to reporter.
In connection with IARD being observed on December 10, Rana Aftab termed lack of awareness about the animal’s rights as one of the big reasons for the inhuman treatment meted out to animals across the globe. “These animals are part of our web of life and we need to protect them for the healthy environment and survival of human life.”
He urged the need of proper implementation mechanism of the rules and regulation and pointed out the need to disseminate the information about the animal rights in national language. “Unawareness make people kill many animals which are important to maintain the natural cycle of the ecosystem.”
He said that the departments working on wild life conservation, national parks and wilderness areas have very limited staff and cannot manage the proper preservations of wild life. “Due to this, illegal hunting of animals is carried out by influential while the situation is better in those areas where community is being involved for the protection of animals.”
The northern areas where local community provides protection to wild life has sufficient number of animals with their natural habitat, he said while urging to engage local communities along with the departments to protect the animal’s life.
He said that incentive-based programs like trophy hunting should be launched across the country which not only help generate revenue and discourage illegal hunting but also increase the interest of the local community through increasing their involvement.
He told that the 70 percent of revenue of trophy hunting is shared with the local community while 30 percent share goes to government.
Talking about the rights of the animals, Rana Aftab was of the view that both domestic and wild animals have rights and “we need to educate out masses about these rights. Provision of proper medical facilities, natural habitat, safety and food to the domestic animal including pet and those involved in labour are the basic rights, he added.
He also highlighted the role of wild animals in maintaining the natural living environment, saying that there is need to protect their natural habitat and stop their illegal hunting for the safeguard of our planet. “Human being, birds, animals and insects all are the parts of web of life and if an one is disturbed, everyone in the web will suffer drastic impacts, including human beings.
“Animals are friends of human beings and we need to create a healthy atmosphere for them to protect the web of life. Stop thinking of animals as human property and think of them as companion animals instead of pets.”
It may be added here that in 1948, the UN passed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on December 10, following the torture subjected to humans during World War II. After this, organizations, associations, and individuals from around the world started demanding that this declaration should be extended to the animal kingdom and that December 10 should also be a day for advocating the rights of animals.
22 years after the UN passed their historic declaration, the word “speciesism” was coined in 1970, to discuss and encourage dialogue on the discrimination against sentient beings based on their species.
Despite the coining of this term, it wasn’t until 1998 when an official statement was passed for animal rights.