Our regrards to the 117 friends of Animal Rescue Sofia who raised over 1550E for the dogs and cats in Bogrov shelter at our Spring Party!!! Thank you so much for joining us – it was wonderful to talk to you and have your support. The donations you’ve raised will all benefit the dogs and cats of  the Bogrov shelter. And of course, we loved the home-baked cakes you brought!

Our thanks to Mrs Anelia from VIRTU interiors and Miroslava Rakiovska for helping out with the merchandise. Thanks to Michaela Vlasseva for her beautiful jewlery she made. Thanks to Pavlina Samokovlieva for her lovely candles and the beautiful photos. Thanks to Kiffles dog treats for coming and donating a part of their profit. And thanks to Zhasmina Atanasova and Sylivia Koleva for their time and care in making everyone comfortable at this party!

See more photos in the GALLERY

See you soon! Our birthday party is planned for MAY 15 – Animal Rescue Sofia turns 1 year old!

Sofia municipal ecological council has voted a new regulation for owned dogs. While there are some very controversial texts about the confiscation of allegedly aggressive dogs and obligatory muzzles for each owned dog over 10kg, it is in general a step in the right direction.

The new regulation deals with the issue of registration, obligating every dog owner to microchip and register their dog. There are fines for those who don’t, as well as free chips for everyone who desides to neuter their pet for free at a neutering centre in the city.

One very important text specifies that a “stray dog” is any dog that is not under total control of the owner. This means dogs living in yards, construction sites, parkings etc. will be now also a part of the TNR program in Sofia.

Useful links (please use your Google translator)

1. Sofia Municipality new regulation (Bulgarian only, in process of voting)

2. I don’t bite – Facebook group against the compulsary muzzle for dogs over 10 kg (Bulgarian only)

3. Our own Stella Raycheva comments the new rules in Bulgaria’s biggest daily – TRUD (Bulgarian only)

4. Niki Rusinovski comments the new rules in WebCafe.bg (Bulgarian only)

Large penalties, as well as imprisonment for up to 3 years for the murdering or mutilation of an animal have now become a part of Bulgaria’s penalty code. The Parliament has voted higher penalties for the organizing and taking part in animal fights, as well as sanctions for owners whose animals have caused physical harm to another person.

MORE INFORMATION ABOUT THE CHANGES IN THE CODE (Bulgarian only)

We are very happy that Bulgaria has joined the civilized world in ruling animal cruelty is a crime. We hope to now have the police working on the cases of animal cruelty occurring in Bulgaria daily.

MORE INFORMATION ABOUT WHAT’S BEEN HAPPENING SO FAR

Romania is about to slaughter 3 million dogs

On the 5th of April the Romanian Commission for Public Administration, which advises the Chamber of Deputies, agreed on a legal amendment which legalizes mass euthanasia of dogs again. With this decision the Commission ignores the advice given on 10 March by the European Parliament.

Since the end of the communist regime of Ceausescu EU member state Romania developed a serious stray dog problem. For decades authorities failed to intervene properly. Dogs were inhumanely caught and killed randomly.

In the nineties The World Health Organization proofed scientifically that killing dogs has no effect on the root cause of the problem. The W.H.O. stated spay/neuter is the only effective way to reduce the number of free roaming dogs besides informing the citizens about responsible dog ownership. Stray dogs are not the problem itself; it’s the irresponsible dog owners who continuously deliver new fertile dogs in combination with corruptive authorities which sabotage spay/neuter projects to make money.

Besides the fact spay/neuter is the only effective way to deal with a surplus of dogs, it is humane and much cheaper than the endless catching and killing of free roaming dogs.

In Romania stray dogs are seldom euthanized humanely. Dogs are being caught violently and beaten to death with baseball bats, shot, poisoned or starved to death.

Several NGO’s have proven that the stray dog problem in Romania can be solved. In the city of Oradea (210,000 inhabitants) the number of stray dogs has been reduced with 90% in 4 years time by spay/neuter all free roaming dogs and educating the public.

Next week the members of the Romanian Chamber of Deputies will vote for the legal amendment. It is likely the Chamber of Deputies will copy the Commission’s decision where after the massacre will start.

The last decade Romania has spent 40 million Euros on tax payer’s money on the stray dog problem, but due to corruption the money ended up in private pockets. The stray dog problem turned into a very profitable business for many politicians and their relatives.

Next week it will become clear if Romania, member of the European Union since 2007, sets itself back in time and lets corruption gain the victory, or act upon the European Commission’s advice and, like neighbor country Bulgaria, starts resolving the stray dog problem nationally, effectively, structurally and humanely.

For more information please contact:
Nathalie Klinge
E-mail address: barkbark@planet.nl

PLESE SIGN THE PETITION – WE ONLY HAVE TILL APRIL 12!

A report has been filed at RIEW-Sofia, after we made a frightening discovery at Iliyancy Bazaar this morning. One of the shops had the skin of a large brindle dog at the entrance as a door mat.

We remind you that on the night 28.08.2010 an unidentified criminal broke into the shelter premises and skinned 3-month old puppy Jessy alive. He left her skin as a token for us to find in the morning.

Bulgaria is the only EU country where cruelty to animals is not regarded a crime. Deeds like this one lead criminals to jail in Europe whilst here, skinning a dog is just a joke. We are still waiting for the Parliament to vote the changes in the Penalty Code.

Full-size photos can be downloaded from HERE

The REPORT in Bulgarian only

Dear friends,

our new adress is http://arsofia.org/

Please, reset your bookmarks.

You can not access us through our ARSofia.com adress, it has been hacked. We are working to solve the matter.

EDIT MARCH 30:

Dear friends,

the organizer of the procession, Mrs Karatzaneva has accused us of “stealing her event” by inviting you with the text below. We have quoted her video, her Facebook page, but haven’t quoted her name. We have appologised, but the Mrs is certain we want to “steal her initiative”…

Therefore we will not take a part of the procession as an organization.The dogs of Bogrov will surely enjoy us staying there.

Best!

* * *

Dear friends, April 04 is the World Stray Animals Day.

Join us next SUNDAY APRIL 03 on a procession in Sofia. See more about the event on Facebook.

Agenda:

11.30 Gathering at the National Palace of Culture, pilonite
12.30 Start of the procession forth to the Parliament
14.00 End of the event

Envite all your friends and print-out some posters. Don’t forget to wear your Animal Rescue Sofia t-shirts :)! ‘

D-r Stankova laughing at the cake she recieved for her 700-th Spay/Neuter surgery at the Bogrov clinic.

Spay/Neuter and Release is the only humane and succesfull method for decreasing stray dog overpopulation. 700 neutered and mostly females, means thousands of unborn puppies have been saved from suffering on the streets of Sofia. Here is the lucky girl with the lucky number:

Bulgaria’s biggest daily newspaper – Trud, has published an article by our  S. Raycheva about the causes and means of control of stray dog overpopulation.

AVAILABLE IN BULGARIAN ONLY

Peter and d-r Nikolova enjoying the fabulous new mini-van!

We are thrilled to announce the purchase of an ARSofia vehicle – thanks to the kindness and generocity of Anita and her husband Jean-Louis from Belgium. The family has made a generous donation in order for us to be able to buy a car for the needs of Animal Rescue Sofia. We found the perfect vehicle – a spacey, hard-working Ford Turneo, sold to us with a discount by Moto-Pfohe.

We can never thank Anita and Lowie enough. We have prepared a small interview with Anita to let you know how we got this fabulous donation:

Lowie and Anita among their crowd of rescued dogs in Belgium

– Could you tell us a bit about yourself and your family?
– I live together with my husband Jean-Louis in Belgium. I got 2 grown kids, they left the house. I got now 8 dogs / 7 cats / 2 indoor little pigs / 4 big outdoor pigs / 2 donkeys / 2 goats / 2 geese / 40 chickens… Most of the animals are saved from awfull situations, slaugtherhouse, killingstations etc.
Since I was a kid, animals have been always very import to me, they are so innocent and helpless. We just want to do everything to help and save animals. 5 years ago we became real vegetarian, the idea that 23 animals are killed for me every year for food makes me sick. And Jean-Louis became also vegetarian some years ago, since that day he tries to convince everybody to be a veggie. He is selling potatoes and vegetables and he is driving in a big truck to his customers with on the side boards text standing like: animals are our friends, don’t eat them.

– Would you tell us about your dogs – the photo shows so many happy tails – who are they and where do they come from?
-I want to introduce first the 4 dogs from Portugal; they are adopted some years ago via a shelter/ngo in Portugal.
Marja ( looks like a sheperd) was raped many times, they broke some of the ribs and they tied her at a doghouse next to a bowl of food.. but because the lash was always to short, she could only see and smell the food.  Then when she was almost dying they gave her the bowl with food… Petra she was found on the street as a puppy, she was trowned full of tar.. she was sticked on the road. Because she was so young and looks full of live in her eyes the NGO deciced not euthanise her but save her. Henny was thrown from a balcony from the 4th flour and broke many bones. The 4th dog from Portugal was just a lucky guy.
Lies and Sjonnie and the other dogs are from a shelter in Belgium. Lies got only one eye and is deaf, Sjonnies leg was broken and can not walk very good. Some dogs I saved from the shelter are so old (12 years old and older) , I just want to give them a last nice peacefull place to die.
And all my cats are also handicapped, they are blind, 3 legs, 1 eye etc.

-How did you get to know about Animal Rescue Sofia?
-I know Animal Rescue Sofia via my friend Birgitta. I think that the work you are doing is just fantastic!
You realised so many things in one year time! e.g. the castration/sterilisations of dogs, you are working together with the municipality / media and of course very important you are trying to convince people in Sofia that they have to adopt a dog from Animal Rescue Sofia instead of buying a pedigree dog. This is the only solution to stop the streetdog problem/suffering.

– How did you decide to make such a donation?
– We are not rich but we are working hard and never go on a holiday, so that we can give this money to animals (help and save lives and stop suffering)  We gave this donation to you because you are doing such a great work and we hope that more people will see that you can do this work only if you are getting support and donations!
You are making a difference for animals in Sofia! and because we learned that you need a car to help more animals, we deciced to give this money to you. Please continue the great work and we hope that on one day there are only happy dogs with an owner :))

Anita, Lewie and Marja infront of their veggie truck saying: Animals are our friends, don’t eat them!

Animal Rescue Sofia thanks Anita and Lowie, wishing them long, healthy lives in happiness – we are thrilled to be recieving this amazing help from such wonderful people.

THANK YOU!

The dogs of Kremikovtzi greet Vessy as she arrives for the routine feeding at the factory grounds.

We go tho the factory two times every week. Each time we leave we take two or more dogs for medical help and neutering at the shelter. As the weather grows warmer we are planning a neutering of all the remaining dogs on the factory grounds.

Photos from last week:

Animal Rescue Sofia, Sofia Municipality, Four Paws Bulgaria and BSAPP have launched a coordinated campaign for the neutering of owned dogs in the Roma neighbourhoods of Sofia. The campaign will last a month, and ARSofia is first to begin it, starting monday 07 of March.

100 dogs will be neutered at the clinic of Bogrov during this campaign. The dogs will be neutered humanely and then returned to their owners.

This is how the procedure goes:

The dogs are voluntarely submitted by their owners and arrive at the clinic by municipal transport.

Each group of dogs is placed in separate cages and checked if they are healthy enough for a Neuter surgery.

Doctor Stankova neuters the dogs and monitors them for 24 hours before they are given back to their owners.

Our warm regards to Dr.Stankova and all our staff and volunteers for this great effort. Many lives will be saved by this campaign – unwanted litters are a major source of stray dogs in Sofia.