Open letter for the attention of Barbara Pompili

Mrs Barbara Pompili

Minister of Ecology, Sustainable Development and Energy

Hôtel de Roquelaure

244 boulevard Saint-Germain

75007 Paris

Vannes, 8 July 2020

Please accept our heartfelt congratulations on your appointment to the Ministry of Ecology, Sustainable Development and Energy.

We hope that your Ministry will finally be able to set a definitive timetable for the measures announced by your two predecessors on wild animals held in captivity and in particular on dolphinariums, the breeding of animals for their fur and non-domestic animals performing in travelling shows, given that our association was the rapporteur of the group on ‘breeding animals for their fur’ and took an active part in the group on ‘wild animals in travelling shows’ and in the one on ‘dolphinariums’.

We note your letter of 6 July 2020 to the Council of State relating to the action for failure to fulfil obligations brought against your Ministry on the question of the banning of keeping cetaceans, which is the reason the hearing initially expected to take place on 9 July 2020 was postponed.

We note, under the terms of this additional statement:

• that at the request of the Prime Minister’s Cabinet and following the interministerial meeting of 13 February 2020 you submitted various scenarios relating to measures to be adopted to improve animal welfare,
• that this process was suspended because of the health emergency,
• that in the case of cetaceans, however, you still wish to adopt measures to improve their welfare.

Nevertheless we should like certain measures to be adopted as a matter of urgency in order to avoid unnecessary suffering.

1. As regards non-domestic animals exhibited in travelling shows

The recent seizure of the lion renamed Jon and of four lionesses kept by the Cirque de Paris and hand-over to our association revealed the mistreatment to which these animals had been subjected. This case echoes that of the bears Micha, Glasha and Bony, but also that of the lion Elyo/Nal and of the elephant Baby, and before her Maya.This list is by no means exhaustive since many others are suffering from being kept in conditions that are totally unsuitable for their basic needs.

We have sent reports to your Ministry written by scientists who are experts in animal welfare (Prof. Harris, Prof. Broom) arguing for an end to such activities, which do not fulfil the physiological and behavioural needs of these animals. We can provide you with these reports along with the scientific and legal files relating to the individuals that we are defending in judicial or administrative courts.

That is why, pending legislation banning these activities once and for all, we are calling on you to take a decision as a matter of urgency confirming the ban on breeding non-domestic mammals and arranging for them to be seized immediately from establishments that keep them.

2. As regards dolphinariums

Since the decree of 3 May 2017 was revoked by the Council of State owing to a procedural irregularity, the breeding of dolphins has once again been authorized in these establishments.

The situation is extremely worrying.

In fact since January 2020 three dolphins have died in French dolphinariums. Lotty’s calf died at Marineland only a few hours after he was born. On 16 June 2020 a dolphin calf died at Planète Sauvage eight days after he was born.

Captive breeding and exchanges of individuals between establishments cause great suffering to these extremely sensitive animals, which are socially complex and have extraordinary cognitive abilities.

It is because of these social and cognitive abilities that in the Declaration of Vancouver of 2012 scientists stated that cetaceans must be deemed to be people and therefore be protected by a number of rights.

In addition, at the 11^th Meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species, the UN recognised that “a certain number of socially complex mammal species, such as several species of cetacean, great ape and elephant, show that they have a non-human culture”.

In the light of all these elements we call on you to adopt, as a matter of urgency, a fresh decree banning the breeding, exchange and importing of any new cetacean in French dolphinariums.

Thank you for your attention to this correspondence.

Yours sincerely,

Muriel Arnal
Chair of One Voice

Translated from the French by Patricia Fairey