Three months before presidential ballot, growing outrage over treatment of animals is forcing politicians to act

A public outcry over cases of horrific abuse against dogs has pushed animal rights to the forefront of the political agenda in Cyprus, three months before presidential elections.

There was outrage over the summer when nine dogs belonging to a family of hunters were burned alive in cages they were never allowed to leave.

Further anger erupted recently when a group of tourists discovered dead and emaciated dogs lying amid excrement and animal remains in enclosures near Paphos in the island’s south-west.

“They were horrified to find dead dogs, starving live dogs and dirty dark green water with living organisms swimming inside,” said the Cyprus Animal Defenders, which uploaded harrowing images from the scene on social media.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Caged dogs with dirty water. Photograph: Cyprus Animal Liberation Front

The former British colony is no newcomer to revelations of animal abuse. In a country where politicians have traditionally kowtowed to a powerful hunters’ lobby infamous for its pursuit of trapping songbirds on limesticks, tales of neglect are legion.

For years Cypriots, following the example of their cousins in Greece, have routinely killed off unwanted cats and dogs by lacing food with a lethal cocktail of herbicides and pesticides. Vigorous opposition to neutering on the grounds that it thwarts a male’s innate right to mate has led to an exploding population of cats and dogs. Local media estimate that the feline population, alone, exceeds 1.2 million.

The penchant for abandoning and killing pets has prompted holidaymakers to boycott the island in the past. In the face of local uproar, politicians who may once have regarded animal rights as beneath them, are at pains to compensate.

The election campaign had barely begun when the Greek Cypriot leader, Nicos Anastasiades – putting dogs and cats centre stage – invited the media to meet Freed, his new puppy, in September.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Cyprus president Nicos Anastasiades. Photograph: TASS/Barcroft Images

Hugging the rescue dog as the cameras rolled, he urged the public to accept abandoned canines into their homes. “I truly love animals,” he wrote in a Facebook post presenting the six-month-old crossbreed. “Shelters are full of little souls that need to receive but also give love and I urge all families to adopt a stray animal.”

The conservative Diko party leader, Nicolas Papadopoulos, had declared an overarching animal protection policy earlier that month, but Anastasiades went further using World Animal Day on 4 October to announce the creation of an “animal police” to deal exclusively with animal protection. The body, expected to begin operating by the end of the year, will be supported by a national agency for animal welfare.

“Our culture is judged by the way we treat animals,” said Anastasiades. “For this reason, the state and society have jointly decided to give animals the respect they deserve.”

The president has also appointed Kyriakos Kyriakou, the head of Cyprus’ Animal party, as a special adviser.

Established in response to the notorious treatment of animals on the island, the party has been instrumental in banning dolphinariums (whose chlorinated waters are known to make dolphins deaf) and closing zoos.

It has also successfully pursued incidents of animal cruelty all the way through to the high court, Kyriakou told the Guardian, citing the infamous case of a Cyprus poodle thrown by hotel employees into a cardboard crusher. But, he insists, there is still so much more to be done.

“We have to stop the cycle of cruelty,” he said. “Fines and punishment must be increased, laws changed, a post of commissioner for animals established, registration and micro-chipping introduced and animal welfare put on the curriculum of schools.”

Anastasiades’ fondness for pets has drawn comparisons with Franklin D Roosevelt, the US president who is reputed to have won an unprecedented fourth term in office in 1944 with a wisecrack about his pet dog Fala. Like Fala, Anastasiades’ previous pooch, Leo, was a black Scottish terrier, widely seen as an electoral asset, before he was run over in February by a presidential guard.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Two stray cats looking for food in Kato Drys. Photograph: Alamy Stock Photo

Cyprus has a long association with cats with St Helena famously introducing the animal to the island in AD324 in a bid to tackle the problem of poisonous snakes. Kyriakou said with mindsets changing, the public were finally beginning to embrace the idea of an island-wide spaying and neutering programme. The government has earmarked €75,000 (£66,000) for the campaign.

For rescue groups, the animal mania is a step in the right direction even if sceptics question the efficacy of an “animal police” and contend the money would be better spent on neutering.

“We have so many cases of stray dogs who are obviously house-trained but are never collected by families in Oroklini,” lamented Louise McElvoy, a British volunteer who rehouses stray dogs to the UK from the village outside Larnaca.

Standing amid crates of freshly groomed pooches at the special baggage dropoff point at Cyprus’ international airport, she added: “Every week we send off dogs to be rehoused. So far, this year, we have sent off 218 dogs and that’s just from Oroklini. There are so many superstitions around animals here. Dogs are regarded as dirty and dangerous and no one likes black dogs, that’s for sure. If politicians can change the culture, if they can lead by example, it is no bad thing.”





• This article was amended on 9 November 2017. The government has earmarked €75,000, not €75m, for the campaign.