A jaguar featured at an Olympic torch ceremony has been shot dead by a soldier shortly after escaping from its handlers, following the event in the Brazilian Amazon city of Manaus.
The jaguar was killed on Monday at a zoo attached to a military training center, when a soldier fired a single pistol shot after the animal, despite being tranquilized, approached the soldier, the army said in a statement.
“We made a mistake in permitting the Olympic torch, a symbol of peace and unity, to be exhibited alongside a chained wild animal. This image goes against our beliefs and our values,” the local organizing committee Rio 2016 said in a statement, adding: “We guarantee that there will be no more such incidents at Rio 2016.”
In the last months too many animals have been killed for human mistakes and this is absolutely unacceptable.
We are talking about the two lions shot to death after a naked man jumped into their cage trying to suicide, the gorilla killed in Cincinnati Zoo after a 4 years old boy felt in his enclosure, five alligators euthanized as search for the boy dragged into orlando lake and finally this jaguar shot to death after being used as mascotte.
How could we dare to exploit other living creatures in this way? Animals are suppose to be protected by humans, we should give them a safe place where to live, protect their natural habitats, instead too often animals are abused, exploited, used for entertainment, their habitats are destroyed and reduced by human activities.
Recently too many animals have been killed and those death could have been avoided, they are due to human mistakes and negligence.
The question we must ask ourselves is why the gorilla was in a cage in that zoo surrounded by people and caos? Why the jaguar was chained in a public manifestation like an object to be shown? Why those lions were exposed in a zoo instead of be in their natural habitats or in a sanctuary?
Animals are not ours to be used, exploited, shown or eaten.
Since there will be someone paying tickets for animals confined in cages in zoo, circus and other unproper places, there will be those accidents and animals we’ll keep dying for no reason.
Let’s stop this abuses, boycott circus, zoos and every place which do not respect animals rights and dignity.
