CAS International was present at historic vote

Utrecht/Barcelona, July 28, 2010 – The Catalan parliament took a historic decision today: just as 70% of the Spanish public, they want to end bullfighting. After years of lobbying, animal protection organizations managed to make the North-Spanish region of Catalonia an official bullfighting free region.

In April 2004, the City Council of Barcelona declared in a vote that they do not want bullfighting anymore, on request of the Spanish organization ADDA in cooperation with CAS International and WSPA. Since only the Catalan parliament is allowed to officially ban bullfighting in Catalonia, animal protection organizations lobbyd with the parliament as well. In December 2009, the parliament adopted a civil initiative presented by the Catalan animal protection organization PROU (Enough!): more than 180,000 Catalans requested a definitive end to the suffering of bulls in the Catalan bullrings. 

More and more bullrings in Catalonia decided to stop organizing bullfights. Now, only in the Barcelona bullring - owned by a private person – these events take place.

Today the Catalan parliament decided enough is enough: they too want an end to bullfighting. The official ban on bullfighting in Catalonia will become effective on January 1st 2012.

CAS International campaigned intensively to end bullfighting in Catalonia, together with PROU, ADDA, WSPA, Humane Society and other organizations.

The director of CAS International, Marius Kolff, was present during the vote in the parliament. Kolff: "It was really exciting, until the last minute we did not know what the result would be. But after about an hour of biting our nails, the results were there: 68 members of parliament voted for a ban! (55 against and 9 MPs did not vote). Of course we are very excited, because this is a huge victory for the bulls and horses that were tortured and killed in Catalonia. Of course CAS International continues campaining, until there is a worldwide ban on bullfighting!"

Before the official vote, the bullfighting industry did everything to prevent a ban on bullfighting in Catalonia. They feared a ban would spread to the rest of Spain and the other bullfighting countries. The Canary Islands were the first autonomic region to ban bullfighting. Now, Catalonia is the second Spanish region that bans this custom.

Also, 92 municipalities in the bullfighting countries declared themselves "Anti-Bullfighting and Friend of the Animals", on request of local animal protection organizations.