WARNING: Graphic content.

“I DIDN’T know,” celebrities say, as they detail the torment dogs go through before they become part of Indonesia’s meat industry.

The Humane Society International is launching its new campaign called “I Didn’t Know” after it conducted a damning investigation into the Asian country’s dog meat trade, calling for an end to the cruel practice.

Shocking investigations carried out by animal campaigners from the “Dog Meat Free Indonesia” coalition has exposed the brutality dogs, most of which are stolen pets, are exposed to when they’re roughly snatched from the streets.

After the dogs are grabbed, their legs and mouths are bound with string, something that makes their mouths bleed but almost completely stops them from breathing.

They’re then crammed into bags and roughly thrown onto the back of a truck before being driven hours to supply markets, slaughterhouses or restaurants.

The animals are then brutally beaten and killed in front of each other.

Celebrities including comedian Ricky Gervais and Absolutely Fabulous star Joanna Lumley are among those calling for Indonesia to be dog-meat-free.

The meat trade, which sees millions of dogs slaughtered for food each year, has been slammed by human and animal rights groups.

Transportation and killing of the dogs can also contribute to the spread of rabies, with traces even being found in the food. The World Health Organisation identified Indonesia’s dog meat trade as a major contributor to the spread of lethal rabies in the country.

“This cruel and unregulated trade is illegal, it has to be condemned and we have to stop it,” a campaigner said in the video.

The most ironic part of the cruel trade is that most Indonesians don’t even eat dog meat.

“Although dog meat is only consumed by a minority of Indonesians — estimated at less than 7 per cent — and only a tiny fraction of society are reliant on it as a primary source of income, the dog meat trade threatens the health and safety of the entire nation. If Indonesia is to achieve its goal to eliminate rabies by 2020, urgent action is required by the government and all sectors of society,” Karin Franken from the Jakarta Animal Aid Network said.

The head of campaigns for the Humane Society International Nicola Benyon, who has lived in Indonesia for a number of years and witnessed the brutality first hand, said it is “horrifying”.

“Indonesia’s dog meat trade is as brutal as it is unsafe, threatening to undo all of Indonesia’s hard work towards achieving rabies-free status by 2020. The Dog Meat Free Indonesia coalition’s investigations have exposed the horrifying suffering that dogs caught up in the dog meat trade endure,” she said.

A news.com.au reporter headed to the Yulin dog meat festival earlier this year, a ten-day celebration held in a small, southern Chinese town.

It has taken place annually since 2009, but proved particularly controversial this year, after animal rights groups erroneously claimed it was shut down.

However their celebrations proved short lived as by June 21 thousands of dogs and cats had been slaughtered with locals unaware of the supposed ban.

Peter Li, a China policy specialist at Humane Society International, who has been to Yulin five times over the last three years, said most of the animals were stolen.

“The local dog meat vendors of course deny that their dogs are stolen household pets or rural guard dogs,” he told news.com.au. “This is because stealing other people’s dogs is a criminal act.”

Dr Yufeng, who founded the Boi Animal Centre in the Chinese city of Guangyuan, said the dog slaughter in China is becoming increasingly more brutal.

“The killings are more brutal and range from hanging and beating the dog repeatedly and repetitively to putting the dog in boiling water, alive, for a few minutes but not long enough for death to come, followed by beating or hanging it to kill it,” she said.

You can sign the petition to end Indonesia’s dog meat trade here.