China Southern Pays U.S. Fine Over Monkey Cargo
April 21, 2014
China Southern Pays U.S. Fine Over Monkey Cargo
Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
China Southern Airlines, a major state-owned
carrier that in March announced it would no longer transport monkeys to
laboratories in the United States, has agreed to pay a fine for
violating an American animal welfare law, according to the United States Department of Agriculture.
The $11,600 fine was levied in January, when the U.S.D.A. accused
China Southern of several violations of the Animal Welfare Act from
August 2012 to August 2013, including transporting 1,380 crab-eating
macaques into O’Hare International Airport in Chicago without proper
registration.
The airline paid the fine on Thursday and
waived its right to a hearing, said a U.S.D.A. spokeswoman, Tanya
Espinosa. Officials at the airline’s headquarters in the southern
Chinese city of Guangzhou could not be reached for comment.
China Southern had long been a major target of animal rights advocates opposed to its role in supplying primates to laboratories in the United States. But in March, after years of campaigns, mostly by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, China Southern announced that it was immediately halting the transports and asked PETA to end its protests.
PETA, which filed the complaint with the
U.S.D.A. about China Southern’s alleged violation of federal
registration requirements in April last year, believes the investigation
that ensued may have contributed to the airline’s decision to quit the
monkey transport business.
“The fact that they knew they were about to
be penalized by the U.S. government might have contributed to the fact
that they realized this is an embarrassing and shameful thing and we
should just distance ourselves from it,” Justin Goodman, PETA’s director
of laboratory investigations department, said in a telephone interview.
This is not the first time the U.S.D.A. has penalized China Southern for transporting monkeys. In May 2012, it accused
the airline of failing to ensure the safety of about 17 monkeys in a
2008 shipment to the United States, resulting in their death from
starvation, dehydration or subsequently being euthanized.
China Southern settled for a fine of $14,438, according to the U.S.D.A.
“PETA is very pleased that China Southern is
no longer involved in this bloody trade and hope that this is the final
chapter in the sordid tale of the airline’s role in the trafficking of
monkeys to laboratories where they are poisoned, crippled and mutilated
in experiments,” Mr. Goodman said.
China Southern’s decision in March to stop
shipping monkeys left Air France as the last major airline on PETA’s
list. But one laboratory animal supplier said the retreat of commercial
airlines from the primate transport business would only drive up the
price of pharmaceuticals.
“The activists may say they are helping
monkeys, but in fact they help the only few large companies in the U.S.
that can afford to charter aircraft for the shipment, now that most
commercial carriers are forced out of the business thanks to PETA,” said
Li Zihan, a New Jersey-based air transportation agent handling the
export of primates from China to the United States and Europe.
“Shipping monkeys will become more expensive,
pushing up the cost of drug manufacturing,” said Mr. Li, who has been
helping Chinese monkey farmers sell their animals for nearly 10 years.
“In the end, it is the consumers who have to pay.”
Mr. Goodman dismissed the criticism as
“fear-mongering.” When they lose the supply of monkeys, he said, the
laboratories will find alternatives.
“The purpose of this campaign is not to stop
science. It is to promote shifts away from the use of monkeys,” he
added, and if the laboratories have a hard time while they scramble for
alternatives, “that’s the point. Hopefully it will spark some
innovation.”
China exported 6,190 crab-eating macaques, a popular laboratory animal, in 2007, most of them to American laboratories, according to a group of Chinese scientists and government officials
speaking at a workshop organized by the Convention on International
Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora, known as Cites, in
2008 to evaluate the impact of international trade on the survival of
the species.
China has been a Cites member since 1981.
But the International Primate Protection
League, an advocacy group, said that the United States imported 13,952
crab-eating macaques from China in 2007.
Primates are an expensive resource for
laboratories. Raising a monkey for two years in the United States can
cost at least $2,000, according to Mr. Li, twice the amount it costs to
raise a monkey in China.
COPY http://international.nytimes.com/
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