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Pigs are being shot so British Army medics can learn to treat battle wounds.

Military surgeons are sent to Denmark for the controversial training on live animals – even though the practice is illegal in the UK.

Animal rights group PETA has slammed the “cruel” practice.

A live pig dangles from a wooden frame as a soldier shoots it to inflict horrific injuries.

Military medics then operate on the animal’s traumatic gunshot wounds while it is still breathing.

The shocking photos taken in Denmark have put the country at the centre of another animal cruelty row after the controversial killing of a giraffe at Copenhagen Zoo.

Campaigners who are disgusted by the pig shootings are demanding an end to the brutal military training courses that are nicknamed Operation Danish Bacon.

This kind of training is banned in Britain – yet our Army medics are sent to Denmark to take part.

Mimi Bekhechi, associate director of animal rights group PETA UK, said: “The overwhelming majority of the UK’s Nato allies do not shoot, stab or dismember animals for their military training exercises.

“The Ministry of Defence’s decision to ship out members of the armed forces for these deadly and cruel exercises in Denmark – which would be illegal if conducted in the UK – is impossible to justify medically, ethically or educationally.”

The pigs are strung up then blasted with an AK-47 rifle or a 9mm handgun.

To give them experience of working on gun wounds, medics then operate on the animals. Even if the surgery is a success, the pigs are later killed.

The British Army sends surgeons to Jaegerspris Kaserne in Denmark twice a year to take part in the exercises.

During the training the pigs are “subjected to bullet and blast wounds”, the UK Government has confirmed. PETA has appealed to the Danish Minister of Defence to stop the country’s animal-based trauma training exercises.

Campaigners argue that hi-tech human simulators should be used instead, adding that they are more realistic than using live animals.

A PETA spokesman said: “Eighty per cent of Nato allies have already ended the cruel use of animals in archaic military medical training exercises.

“Instead of shooting, stabbing and blowing up animals, military personnel in these nations are trained to treat traumatic injuries using life-like human-patient simulators, such as the state-of-the-art Caesar military simulator.

“This is used by the Nato Centre of Excellence for Military Medicine, as well as other non-animal methods that have repeatedly been shown in military and civilian studies to teach lifesaving skills better than crude animal laboratories.”

PETA has also filed a complaint with the European Commission against Denmark over the training courses.

An EU directive, as well as Denmark’s Animal Welfare Act, require that non-animal methods should be used to train the military whenever available.

A former US military medical worker – who is now with PETA – insisted that compared to operating on animals that have been stabbed or shot, the

lifelike human simulators are a far superior way of preparing doctors to treat injured humans.

Experts said the Caesar patient simulator, which “breathes” and “bleeds”, can be used anywhere.

It has been developed to give medics the best possible grounding in how to deal with casualties on the front line and in disaster zones.

The MoD has strongly defended sending its medical staff for the live animal training.

A spokesman said: “We cannot comment on images that we have not seen.

"Our military surgeons undertake vital training in Denmark where they learn specialist trauma treatment skills that save lives on the battlefield.

“All animals used in medical training are anaesthetised before they are treated and by participating in the Danish-led exercises twice a year rather than conducting our own, we minimise the overall number of animals used.”

These never-before-seen photographs of pigs being shot follow Denmark coming under heavy fire over its treatment of giraffes.

This month the zoo in Copenhagen killed a giraffe called Marius to avoid interbreeding – then his body was dissected and fed to the lions as young children watched.

Staff received death threats after the animal’s death.

Another zoo in Denmark then considered killing a giraffe, also called Marius, to avoid fights among males after the planned arrival of a female.

Marius won a reprieve because moves to introduce the female were shelved.

(Image: Rex)

Genetic similarities between people and pigs

Pigs are genetically very close to humans.

The flesh of swine is so similar to our own that if you eat under-cooked pork you can get parasites that live equally as well in our own flesh.

In 2000 a heart doctor gave a patient a transfusion of pig’s blood following a number of attempts at animal-to-human organ transplants.

London surgeon Dr Dhaniram Baruah injected more than half a pint of the blood into a man suffering from severe anemia.

The term ‘long pork’ was reportedly coined by cannibals because human meat tastes like pork.

During an interview from his prison cell Germany’s infamous cannibal Armin Meiwes - who ate an estimated 20kg of his victim - said: “The flesh tastes like pork.

“It tastes a little bit more bitter, stronger. It tastes quite good.”