News Archive - Page 2 of 128

In Jasseron (Ain), inauguration of the department’s first Chatipi on February 22 to help stray cats!

In Jasseron (Ain), inauguration of the department’s first Chatipi on February 22 to help stray cats!
09.02.2025
Ain
In Jasseron (Ain), inauguration of the department’s first Chatipi on February 22 to help stray cats!
Domestic animals

One Voice, which has been fighting against feline straying for years, is setting up three-way partnerships with municipalities or places such as hospitals or retirement homes, and local associations, to identify, sterilize and release homeless cats by providing them with a wooden chalet to hydrate, feed and comfort themselves. The town council of Jasseron in the Ain contacted One Voice for this purpose, with the help of local association Le Clan Fél’Ain. In addition to protecting cats without human families from misery, the Chatipi project raises public awareness of the problem of feline straying. In Jasseron, the educational aspect of the program is reinforced by the participation of elementary school children, who will have the task to feed the cats when they go to the canteen at lunchtime, and help to sort the canteen’s food waste thanks to the compost bin located near the Chatipi. The inauguration of the Chatipi will take place at Place Bernard Chanel in Jasseron, on Saturday February 22 at 11:00 am.

The inauguration will take place on Saturday, February 22 at 11:00 a.m., in front of the chatipi at Place Bernard Chanel, near the elementary school. It will be attended by Mayor Sébastien Gobert, his local councillor Adrien Bour, who is in charge of monitoring the project, the association Le Clan Fél’Ain, represented by its president Mr. Antonin Gilbaud, and Mrs. Mathilde Perrot for the One Voice association.

Chatipi, a sustainable solution to the vicious circle of cat straying

Chatipi is an ethically-driven initiative aimed at creating shelters for stray cats, to help them and raise public awareness of their distress and needs. Nearly sixty have already been set up across France, sometimes within nursing homes, health facilities or hospitals to bring comfort to residents too, and close to schools for educational purposes, a fundamental element in putting an end to mistreatment and common preconceptions. All too often, our feline friends are wrongly portrayed as independent animals capable of surviving on their own. This is not at all the case: life outdoors is a misery for stray cats, who fall ill far more often than those living with their families, and have to cope with the cold, bad weather, and sometimes even human malice.

Sharing out of tasks and responsibilities

One Voice, which invented the Chatipi concept, usually provides the chalet for the cats. In this case, the town council decided to renovate an abandoned building. One Voice has supplied cat flaps and educational panels, and will pay the veterinary costs (sterilizations, identifications, tests) for fifteen cats at the start of the operation.

The premises have been fitted out by the town hall, which will be responsible for cleaning the place and feeding the feline residents, with the help of elementary school children, supervised by an adult, who will take part in the feeding process at the same time as depositing canteen food waste in the compost bin located near the Chatipi. During the vacations, this task will be entrusted to the technical department staff.

The Clan Fél’Ain association, for its part, will be responsible for monitoring the health of the animals, organizing trapping and transport to the veterinary clinic, and covering long-term veterinary costs (with a maximum annual subsidy of 200 euros from the town council). The most sociable cats will be offered for adoption.

The One Voice website dedicated to the Chatipi program was inaugurated at the beginning of March 2022 and provides a wealth of information about this educational program for cats. Sign our petition calling for an emergency plan on feline straying.

Our dying companions, focus on the fate of dogs in laboratories

Our dying companions, focus on the fate of dogs in laboratories
07.02.2025
France
Our dying companions, focus on the fate of dogs in laboratories
Animal testing

Photo : TheCampBeagle.com

In France, between mid-December and mid-January, the Ministry of Higher Education and Research (MESR) authorized the use of 600 dogs in future scientific experiments.

Although they are – in theory – the most protected animals in France, when they cross the path of experimenters, they are not spared…

Through these projects, we reveal the reality they endure in laboratories in the name of so-called innovation, while frequently dying to assess the toxicity of pre-existing products.

A lifetime behind bars

These young puppies destined for laboratories are born in concrete kennels. Some of them are born “programmed” to endure tests: genetically modified or selected to develop diseases, they are bred only to become living test tubes. Considered as products or equipment, locked up, with no social contact or affection.

Since its creation, One Voice has been fighting against these breeding farms, such as those run by Marshall BioResources (MBR) in Gannat and Mézilles, France.

Once transported to the laboratories, their daily lives remain the same: small, cold cubicles and constant isolation to the point of insanity.

Condemned to an existence devoid of everything that makes them dogs, they gradually sink into distress: some become apathetic, others go round in endless circles, but nobody cares.

For the researchers, these behaviors are merely a side-effect of the protocols, mere collateral damage. How they feel is irrelevant: what matters is that the experiment should run its course. So, when the trials come to an end, the solution is obvious. Instead of trying to rehabilitate them by giving them a second chance, we eliminate them. Unadapted to life outside the kennels, too traumatized to find a family, they are put to death with no other alternative.

Out of the cage: painful, often fatal experiences

The rare moments when these dogs, generally beagles – because they are the most docile and affectionate, a specificity of which MBR has made its fortune – leave their cells, are not synonymous with respite. On the contrary, they are taken to the protocol room to undergo all kinds of tests. Some have their blood taken sixteen times in twenty-four hours – in other words, every 90 minutes! Others will be locked in metabolic cages where they can barely move for 48 hours, just to collect their urine, which will be used to measure the toxicity of the new drugs.

To assess the effectiveness of new vaccines, the dogs will be infected with a virus that causes convulsions, unbearable abdominal pain, diarrhea and vomiting. Pus will flow from their noses, and their skin will not be spared either.

After years of forced terror, these beagles that have been used for a single vaccine are killed as a “safety measure”. They generally end their lives in the freezers of the laboratories that exploited them, before being incinerated like toxic waste, their existence reduced to “scientific use”.

The figures are not in their favor…

Although 3 out of 4 French people are opposed to animal experimentation, 2,200 of the 8,709 dogs used throughout the European Union died in French laboratories in 2022 (latest figures published).

In short, our country has retained its title of torturer-in-chief. In October 2024, a single project condemned 2,000 dogs to test the toxicology of a drug. In contradiction with the reduction requirements of the European directive…

Despite the Ministry’s countless false pretences, which still fail to distinguish between the number of animals used for the first time in research and those reused, we continue to analyze the dozens of projects it authorizes every day in order to denounce the sham transparency it presents to us. As a result, we are eagerly awaiting the figures for 2023, and will not be satisfied with the report presented to the public. As we do every year, we have requested the raw data files from the MESR to continue our fight against the opacity associated with animal experimentation.

Act now to help us put an end to experimentation on dogs: sign our petition and demand their protection!

In the Haute-Saône and Meurthe-et-Moselle regions, prefects gave carte blanche to kill animals

In the Haute-Saône and Meurthe-et-Moselle regions, prefects gave carte blanche to kill animals
28.01.2025
In the Haute-Saône and Meurthe-et-Moselle regions, prefects gave carte blanche to kill animals
Wildlife

In the Haute-Saône region, the prefect has authorized the agents of the French Biodiversity Agency (OFB) and the lieutenants of louveterie and pests to kill as many coypus and muskrats as they please until the end of 2025. In the Meurthe-et-Moselle region, all animals considered as “game” and presenting a so-called “risk to public safety” are targeted until December 31… 2029! We are calling for the immediate suspension of these scandalous texts, and will be at the Besançon administrative court on February 10 at 2pm, then in Nancy the following day, at the same time.

The prefects are passing the word around. After the Indre-et-Loire and Ain prefects, it’s now the turn of the Haute-Saône and Meurthe-et-Moselle prefects to delegate life-or-death powers over animals to lieutenants of louveterie and pests. What about the orders that should normally be issued before each administrative beat hunt, the obligation to justify them and limit them in time and space? The State washes its hands of the matter. With its green light, valid for one year in the Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region and no less than five years in the Grand-Est region, sworn hunters can now organize these operations as they please, and shoot at anything that moves without referring to the authorities.

Unjustified and illegal regulations…

In the Haute-Saône region, the prefect may well have pulled a “ready-made” excuse out of his hat (coypus and muskrats are increasing in number, endangering riverbanks and certain structures), but no data has been added to the file to back up these assertions… But never mind: here, as in the Hautes-Pyrénées region or Corsica, the word of the State’s representatives is enough to exterminate all the individuals in their sights. Especially when they have been unjustly classified as “ESOD”. Victims of demented persecution, they can already be shot, trapped or dug up all year round, without any prior authorization. So why bother with damage control?

… published after the carnage began

In the Meurthe-et-Moselle region too, the prefecture is not afraid of being illegal. Not content with subjecting animals to uncontrolled pressure for years to come, it published its deadly decree a fortnight after it came into force. A well-known strategy by now, aimed at preventing us from taking legal action in time to save lives… But we’re not giving in and have counter-attacked, as we always do, the regions involved in these little arrangements. This collusion with hunters must stop!

In order to make the voices of the animals targeted by these texts heard, we’ll be at the hearing on February 10 at 2pm at the Besançon administrative court for the Haute-Saône region, then at the one on February 11 at 2pm at the Nancy administrative court for the Meurthe-et-Moselle region.

NO to the European law against wolves dictated by the lobbies!

NO to the European law against wolves dictated by the lobbies!
03.02.2025
NO to the European law against wolves dictated by the lobbies!
Wildlife

Lobbies are attacking wolves from all sides. In France, they are being martyred by the government’s constant gifts to breeders, constantly making it easier to resort to lethal shooting. In Europe, they will soon be downgraded… Following a request to the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), we are once again appealing to the representatives of the Bern Convention to see reason, in an open letter.

The downgrading of wolves? Handed on a plate to the hunters’ and breeders’ lobby, just like the relaxing of lethal shootings against them!

Two months after the dire approval of the European downlisting, we are continuing to fight to defeat this decision and the political maneuvers riddled with the lobbies’ wishes!

The deadly reign of the lobbies who want to finish off wolves in France…

Distraught, scandalized, but not surprised, because the desire to harm canids is no longer even concealed. We have just learned that the Savoie Mont-Blanc Interdepartmental Chamber of Agriculture is behind the sudden desire to modify the decree orchestrating the shooting of wolves. We’re not going to pretend to be surprised to discover that breeders are pulling the strings!

We opposed this new sinister project by responding to the public consultation and firmly denouncing these new anti-wolf measures. The return of these animals is a real boon for biodiversity, both in reality and according to the majority of French people.

With 192 wolves at risk of being shot in France this year, and 2025 barely underway, nine of them have already perished under the gunshots granted by the prefects. We fear the worst for their survival in France, at a time when the population is already in decline. And rightly so, farmers are constantly after the wolves: when they’re not shamelessly inciting to poach them, they’re scheming with the Ministry of Ecology to further entrench their hypocrisy and recalcitrance to protect the flocks they’re responsible for.

The hatred of the farming world is also falling on the agents of the French Biodiversity Agency (OFB), who are seeing their expert missions (essential for recognizing the damage supposedly attributed to wolves) increasingly hijacked by government departments. How can we trust politicians under such conditions, when the evidence of their complacency towards the farming and hunting lobbies is mounting?

The perpetual relaxation of the wolf culling policy is a real threat to the conservation of wolves, both in France and in Europe.

… and in Europe: we fight back!

The drive to wipe out canids is continuing at an European level.

Following our inter-association request to the European Court of Justice and our repeated appeals to representatives of the Bern Convention, we are once again sounding the alarm.

The Committee seems to be making an admission of weakness in its decision of December 6, 2024, and recognizes that things have been done backwards. Indeed, it calls for the creation of a working group to define an objective framework for amendments to species protection status. Since when has it been possible to decide to remove animals from the scope of strict protection, even before objective methods have been defined? And then to assert: « Let’s establish consistent rules for those that remain. »

These extremely intelligent and sensitive animals have their rightful place in nature. The outcome of this decision marks a profound step backwards for biodiversity. The Commission preferred to kneel before the lobbies rather than listen to thousands of serious scientists. Wolves risk being massacred and the health of our ecosystems scorned. Muriel ARNAL President of One Voice

We are therefore once again addressing the delegates of the species protection text, asking them to withdraw the proposal and examine it more rigorously, in line with their own recommendations, which they did not bother to follow last December!

Read our letter to Charles-Henri DE BARSAC.

In the meantime, the fight goes on! Join us in Strasbourg on February 13 in front of the Council of Europe: together, we’ll make the voice of the wolves heard loud and clear! If you can’t make it, please sign our petition.

Marineland, Planète Sauvage: the same fight for France’s cetaceans!

Marineland, Planète Sauvage: the same fight for France’s cetaceans!
31.01.2025
France
Marineland, Planète Sauvage: the same fight for France’s cetaceans!
Exploitation for shows

One month after the closure of Marineland, the fate of the dolphins hangs in the balance. After fears that the dolphins would be sent to China, the French Minister of Ecology has finally announced that she will veto this destination. We demand that their well-being and the end of their exploitation come before any other consideration. Why this persistent refusal to sit around the table?… Especially when at Planète Sauvage reproduction continues. We’ll be outside the Nantes park on Saturday February 8, the day it reopens.

Western parks are overflowing

At the end of January 2025, the French Minister for Ecological Transition announced that she would refuse to allow Marineland’s dolphins to be sent to China… A good thing too… even if, clearly, this announcement comes very late!

The captivity market is saturated. And in France – we’ve been experiencing this bitterly since the vote on the 2021 law, which the French government itself initiated – our government seems to be discovering every day that there’s no more room in European parks for the survivors of endless breeding and training.

Sleights of hands, euthanasia… and breeding in full swing

As proof of this, the Greek park Attica – where Naska and Ekinox, both born at Parc Astérix a few years before its closure, are still sequestered – is sending five dolphins to Clearwater in Florida.

Will some of Marineland’s dolphins be killed? The question must be asked. We’ve reached this point because when the captivity industry no longer wants animals, when they are no longer profitable, either for breeding or for circus acts, it kills them. We remember the tragic fate of Ekinox’s mother, Femke.

At the same time, Planète Sauvage continues to make money off cetaceans, with the birth of dolphin calves in overcrowded tanks. We’re choking.

What are our leaders doing, apart from burying their heads in the sand?

Where is the ministerial decree awaited for over three years after the law was passed? Where are the sit-down discussions needed to find truly acceptable solutions?

One month after the closure of Marineland, the future of captive dolphins in France remains bleak. We’re looking for ways out for those on the Côte d’Azur, while on the Atlantic coast dolphins are giving birth again and again… Where will these babies end up?

We’ll be there next Saturday, February 8, in front of Planète Sauvage, which continues to train and breed under the guise of a “scientific and protection mission”, as the legal newspeak so aptly puts it.

Venanson: when a deputy mayor poaches chamois with hunters. We are filing a complaint!

Venanson: when a deputy mayor poaches chamois with hunters. We are filing a complaint! 20.01.2025
Venanson
Venanson: when a deputy mayor poaches chamois with hunters. We are filing a complaint! Wildlife

The deputy mayor of the village of Venanson was caught by the French Biodiversity Agency (OFB) on October 12 and 13, 2024 poaching chamois with members of the local hunting society. Who says an elected representative has to respect the law? One Voice has filed a complaint following this scandal.

The town council of the village of Venanson in the Alpes-Maritimes region has a poacher in its ranks! Yes, a member of the executive who is supposed to represent the public service was caught red-handed on October 12 and 13.

On the one hand, he was caught chasing chamois in the company of seven other hunters, even though the prefectoral decree limits the maximum number of participants to four. On the other hand, this man, who is none other than the president of the local hunting society, and his accomplices took dogs, collateral victims of hunting abuses, into this illegal pursuit of peaceful ruminants, even though their presence has been forbidden by ministerial decree since 1986.

An obvious firm response from the Prefect: glad to hear it!

The Alpes-Maritimes prefect has decided to ban chamois hunting in the village for the 2024-2025 season. That’s the least he could do! For once, a representative of the State is showing a little common sense and recognizing the many failings of this deadly activity… In the decree, he points out that these repeated acts of poaching exerted “significant pressure on the species and a risk of endangering its good conservation status“.

One Voice has of course lodged a complaint with the Nice legal tribunal. Chamois must be able to live in peace, and no longer be the victims of poaching or false accusations by those who love dead nature.

We invite you to sign the Humanimo petition opposing the massacre of chamois in another region: the Doubs. For them, we have already written to the local prefecture along with other associative partners.

Towards the recognition of animal welfare? Constitutional Council hearing on February 4, 2025

Towards the recognition of animal welfare? Constitutional Council hearing on February 4, 2025
28.01.2025
Versailles
Towards the recognition of animal welfare? Constitutional Council hearing on February 4, 2025
Exploitation for shows

We are asking the French Constitutional Council to solemnly recognize the notion of animal welfare. On February 4 at 3pm, it will examine our priority issue of constitutionality (QPC) at the Versailles Court of Appeal. In particular, the Council will have the opportunity to extend the ban on exploiting wild animals to all circuses!

While the parliamentary debates on the November 30, 2021 law provided for a total ban on wild animals in circuses, in the end this will only apply to traveling establishments from 2028. And with the government’s complicity, they’ll even just have to park their cage trucks for good to keep the animals and continue captivity, training and shows.

Instead of funding sanctuaries as promised, and seeking solutions for these animals who have been mistreated all their lives, our government once again decides to turn a blind eye to the tragic fate of hundreds of big cats, primates, zebras, birds and Samba, the last elephant held by a circus in France, and thus prolong their suffering with circus performers.” Muriel Arnal President of One Voice

Far from the hope of a peaceful retirement promised to them by our leaders, for the animals kept in circuses, the prospect of endless exploitation is taking shape. In the context of our request against the automatic equivalence allowing traveling circuses to settle down, the Council of State has referred the QPC we raised to the Constitutional Council.

For the sake of children, for the sake of animals, let’s ban circuses with animals!

Not only are we asking the Constitutional Council to legally enshrine the protection of animal welfare, which would then be imposed on all laws and public authorities, but also that it strongly affirms that animal shows are contrary to the principle of “environmental education” recognized by the Charter of the Environment.

As over 100 psychologists assert^[1], children’s exposure to circus performances can lead them to “deny messages of pain and hinder the development of empathy that is crucial during the process of development and growth, and hence [to] produce an incongruous response – i.e. joy and amusement – to punishment, discomfort and injustice”

On February 4 at 3pm, we’ll be at the Versailles Court of Appeal for a hearing during which the Constitutional Council will examine this possibility. In the meantime, join us in calling for a ban on the exploitation of animals in circuses, for Samba, Jumbo and all the others.

^[1] See Appendix 3, page 40: “Declaration by psychologists on the anti-educational value of animal mistreatment in circuses and shows”

Angora rabbits: despite a denial of justice, let’s say stop to fur!

Angora rabbits: despite a denial of justice, let’s say stop to fur!
27.01.2025
Angora rabbits: despite a denial of justice, let’s say stop to fur!
Fashion

In 2016, we revealed unbearable images of Angora rabbits exploited for their wool, howling in pain at the hands of a breeder. Despite our multiple investigations and nine years of legal battles, the examining magistrate decided not to prosecute. For the animals exploited and killed by this industry, we are continuing the fight by keeping up the pressure on brands: after convincing MaxMara, we are addressing Gérard Darel to urge it to change its practices. In February, support this initiative by sharing our letter, and join us in the many cities where we will be present to say stop to this industry of suffering!

Animals tortured, and justice denied

In 2016, we revealed images of an Angora rabbit farm exploited for the fashion industry. These animals are kept in cages, just like all those who are bred for their fur. But here, the males are killed by hand at birth, and the females used for their hair and reproduction. Hair removal sessions in which the gentle rodents are stretched and held in place on a plank while their hair is plucked from all over their bodies, and they scream in a high-pitched voice, their skin raw, before, terrified, they are put back in their cages until the next session.

The reaction of the authorities was simple and sadly predictable: “Move along, nothing to see here!” The Ministry of Agriculture even assured us that the “depilation” method was painless and supposedly “validated by INRA”. They then told the Commission for access to administrative documents (CADA), which we had referred to, that no such document existed. As for the courts, despite our new images from 2018 and 2020 and the reports of our experts, it has been no use: for them, these cries do not necessarily reveal pain, but simply “slight stress”. And yet, without terror or acute distress, rabbits never scream.

New or vintage, a fur coat is a no-no!

The fact that it’s second-hand doesn’t change a thing: behind an angora garment, there’s always a life of caging, suffering and mutilation. At a time when fur seems to be making a comeback among some young people, and since the issue has become a societal blind spot since the closure of mink farms at the end of 2021, we’re relaunching a major campaign against animal products (including feathers and exotic skins in particular) in fashion.

While some brands, such as Gucci, Versace, Armani, Lacoste, Ba&sh and American Vintage, have already renounced fur, others prefer to remain stubborn. Behind all the rhetoric about animal welfare, for some people the lives of animals are worth nothing when their bodies or parts are sold for a high price.

As part of the ICE Fur Free Europe campaign run by Eurogroup for Animals with the support of the Fur Free Alliance, of which we are the French representative, we are working to make decisive progress towards banning the fur trade in the European Union. After our action last year to persuade MaxMara to stop using fur in its creations, the brand announced it was halting its production.

Today, we’re urging Gérard Darel to follow suit and commit to more ethical fashion. We invite you to write to the top-of-the-range brand, which values French savoir-faire: we no longer want fashion that comes from animal misery, luxury can renew itself through innovation.

And to go even further, join us at one of the many events we’re organizing in February as part of our national campaign!

In the Hérault region, the scandal of animals poisoned in the wild

In the Hérault region, the scandal of animals poisoned in the wild
22.01.2025
Hérault In the Hérault region, the scandal of animals poisoned in the wild
Domestic animals

Since January 8, 2025, two dogs, two horses and several wild boars have died in a town in the Hérault region, after being cowardly poisoned. These acts of abject cruelty present a risk of environmental contamination. One Voice has lodged a complaint.

Since the beginning of January, a veritable hecatomb has been taking place in the town of Gigean. Two dogs, two horses and wild boars died after eating poisonous pieces of bread scattered along their path. Their deaths, in unspeakable suffering, took place at a time when they were in the best of health and going about their day like any other. A terrible image: the two equines, thought to be safe by their human companion, collapsed in a matter of seconds. The murderous intent is unmistakable. An investigation has been launched and the mayor has lodged a complaint.

A deadly frenzy

In the wild, wild animals must constantly fight for their survival, escape hunters’ bullets and deadly traps, to which even our domestic companions like Koukou, Cooky and Tigrou are regularly exposed. But here we are: this display of legal violence is not enough.

Some resort to even greater sadism, poisoning their victims. It’s an outlawed method, but one that’s highly prized by animals’ enemies, especially those of wolves and stray cats, who suffer from a persistent persecution.

And beyond these tragic deaths, the entire environment, from the health of the soil to that of small animals, is threatened by these outrageous acts. We will not let such crimes go unpunished!

On behalf of the animals killed in Gigean, and in support of the mayor’s complaint, we have sent our complaint to the Montpellier legal tribunal.

To ensure that horses are granted pet status and better protection, sign our petition.

Illustration photo

No New Year’s resolutions for French labs: 40,000 rodents condemned in one week

No New Year’s resolutions for French labs: 40,000 rodents condemned in one week
13.01.2025
France
No New Year’s resolutions for French labs: 40,000 rodents condemned in one week
Animal testing

The French Ministry of Research is off to a flying start this year. By approving twenty projects between January 1 and 6, 2025, no fewer than 40,000 rodents will be condemned to painful experiments and certain death. At this breakneck pace, the number of animals used for testing for the first time in 2025 will continue to exceed 2,000,000…

One Voice reveals the fate reserved for the first individuals sacrificed this year.

A life of torment under the guise of experimentation

To begin with, over 7,000 mice and their offspring will suffer heart attacks. None will survive. Thousands of rats will undergo painful surgery to attach a luminous implant to their brains, before being deprived of food and forced to perform exercises in exchange for a little food. After all this suffering, they will be killed to recover their brains.

Dozens of rabbits will have their eardrums perforated, while the same studies will induce cancer and fatal kidney failure in thousands of mice. Others will undergo force-feeding, and finally, over 25,000 rodents will be injected by every conceivable route with chemical or radioactive compounds, just to see the path these products follow in their bodies, before being killed.

Three quarters of them will die after these experiments. As for the others…

Three-quarters of the animals used in these sordid projects will be killed after the procedures for their organs and tissues. Some will be murdered with an overdose of anesthesia, others gassed progressively with carbon dioxide. The less fortunate will have their cervical vertebrae legally dislocated, their skulls struck to induce lethal shock, or will be decapitated…

The remaining quarter will soon be reused in other protocols before dying in the same appalling conditions.

If, like us and 75% of the French population, you believe in suffering-free science, join us in putting an end to animal experimentation!