LONDON – PETA supporters armed with signs reading, “Congress: No More Monkey Business! Stop Primate Imports!” are set to descend on Dulles International Airport on Thursday December 22.
The planned demonstration by the animal rights group was prompted by reports that AELF FlightService’s Maleth Aero airline has flown thousands of endangered long-tailed macaques from Cambodia and Vietnam into Washington Dulles International Airport (IAD).
The December 22nd protest action aims to reach legislators who are traveling home for the holidays at the end of the congressional session.
The monkeys were reportedly bound for facilities owned by the infamous Inotiv and Charles River Laboratories.
PETA’s primate defenders plan to expose this shameful monkey importation pipeline and pressure legislators to direct the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to end all shipments of monkeys to U.S. laboratories.
PETA protest location
Where: Dulles International Airport (departures entrance), 1 Saarinen Cir., Dulles, Virginia
When: Thursday, December 22, 3:30 p.m.
Recent US DOJ indictments
The demonstration follows the U.S. Department of Justice indictments of those involved in an alleged monkey-smuggling ring that supplied U.S. laboratories with long-tailed macaques abducted from their forest homes in Cambodia and falsely identified as captive-born.
The International Union for Conservation of Nature recently declared long-tailed macaques an endangered species, and their population decline is due in large part to voracious demand from the U.S. animal experimentation industry.
“Terrified, endangered monkeys are being torn from their forest homes and sent to their inevitable deaths in stark laboratories, and every player involved in this process is complicit,” says PETA Senior Vice President Kathy Guillermo.
“PETA is urging lawmakers to crack down on this stream of suffering before we wipe this species off the planet entirely.”
The carriage of live animals by airlines
IATA Live Animals Regulations
The IATA Live Animals Regulations (LAR) are the worldwide standard for transporting live animals by commercial airlines.
Whether it is a pet, an animal transported for zoological or agricultural purposes or for any other reason, the objective of the IATA LAR is to ensure that all animals are transported safely and humanely by air.
The 49th Edition of the Regulations is set to come into effect on 1 January 2023.
It should also be made clear that many airlines are aware of the problems associated with the carriage of animals for testing purposes, and their internal policies preclude such cargo operations.
PETA has confirmed that United Airlines, American Airlines, Southwest Airlines, and Delta Air Lines are among the many major companies that do not fly monkeys or other primates destined for laboratories or laboratory suppliers.
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