Shortcast #65 OTL | Standing up for Turkey's Street Dogs

Off the Leash

Off the Leash's Charlie Moores and Dominic Dyer discuss the brutal crackdown on street dogs in Turkey - and just to be clear at NO stage do we go into graphic or upsetting detail.
Street dogs and cats have always been a part of life in Turkey's cities. Mark Twain wrote in 1867 that “The dogs sleep in the streets, all over the city. …They would not move, though the Sultan himself passed by,” and filmmaker Elizabeth Lo, whose documentary “Stray” had its streaming release in early 2021, said she was struck by “seeing dogs roaming around freely, living life on their own terms, in this very developed city,” and by the relationship she observed between them and Istanbul’s human residents.
Istanbul is home to some 400,000 to 600,000 stray dogs and cats, according to Ahmet Atalık who oversees veterinary services for the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality. There has long been a live and let live attitude to street dogs in Turkey, so what has changed so that they are now being persecuted?

• DuvaR.english Animal rights defenders fear for dogs' lives after Erdoğan targets stray dogs (26 Dec 2021)
• The Independent Turkey’s Erdogan shows bark and bite by targeting stray dogs in culture war (29 Dec 2021)