Animal rights activists have rescued more than 1,000 starving cats, on their way to slaughterhouses in the south of China.

Members of the Suzhou Small Animal Protection Association (SSAPA) seized a truck carrying the cats in Jiashan county, in China's eastern Zhejiang province.

The activists claimed that had the cats reached their destination, the southern Guangdong province, they would have been sold for meat.

Rescue operation: Animal rights activists rescued an estimated 1,000 cats from a truck in the Jiashan county, in China's eastern Zhejiang province

Tragic: The seized truck was carrying 50 cages, with an estimated 20 starving cats crammed into each

The cats were rescued after a local resident tipped off the SSAPA about the truck, which packed full of around 50 cages.

Each tiny cage was reported to contain around 20 cats.

A number of the animals crammed inside the truck were badly injured and malnourished, according to the charity.

Head of the SSAPA, Xiaobai, reported that nearly half of the rescued cats died shortly after the rescue, as many of them were still too young to have been separated from their mothers.

He added that one in three of the rescued cats were wearing collars, meaning that they had been captured illegally, snatched from their loving owners.

The charity added that a police investigation is warranted as a a result of the theft.

Illegal trade: The truck was destined for China's southern Guangdong province, which consumes most of China's controversial cat and dog meat

Horrific: Activists from the SSAPA organisation reported that many of the animals were badly injured and malnourished, and nearly half died following the incident

But truck driver Liu Yen, insisted that the animals had all been abandoned by their owners and had been sold to dealers.

The SSAPA said the animals were 'more than likely' to have been on their way to slaughterhouses, from which their meat would have been sold to restaurants.

The allegation was not confirmed by the truck driver.

Guangdong province consumes most of China's controversial dog and cat meat, with up to four million cats consumed in China every year.

Loved pets: One in three of the rescued cats were still wearing their collars, and the charity insisted that a police investigation into the stolen pets is warranted

Meat trade: China's illegal dog and cat meat trade is still thriving, with more than 670 dogs rescued from trucks in just three days between June and July this year

Meanwhile, more than 400 dogs who were being illegally transported to a Chinese slaughterhouse were rescued in July, after a 50-hour standoff between activists and an animal trafficker.

The starving animals were crammed in tiny cages and had been collected from all over the country to travel to Guangxi in the south-east.

Just two days before the incident, over 270 more dogs were unloaded from an equally-squalid truck near Tianjin, north-east China.

Guangxi province is also the home of the notorious annual dog-meat eating festival in the Chinese city of Yulin.