Bericht einer Tierschützerin aus Kairo

Folgender Bericht erreichte uns. Mit freundlicher Erlaubnis der Autorin veröffentliche ich ihn hier im Original:

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Hi Sir XY,

Apologies for not writing sooner.  As you can imagine it is mayhem here, even on the level of our own personal lives and trying to care for the 600 animals in our shelter ‚from a distance‘.  General situation in the streets :

-Animals are being dumped on the streets – today I went to the shelter (first time i have been able to leave my house in relative safety).
We found a dalmation dog dumped in Maadi and 3 persian cats dumped in various areas, plus orphaned puppies and kittens)

-Many foriegners have left, some have been forced to leave….I hate to think of how many animals have been euthanised by their owners, many people feel this is the only solution when they are forced to evacuate….Others obviously have left them to ‚take their chances‘ on the streets of Cairo!

-We are terrified of how many ‚pets‘ may have perished in the locked up.  We will not be able to investigate until our volunteers are able to move freely on the streets.

-We have sent some of our volunteers who live near the Giza Zoo to go inside and check (although it is closed to the Public) they insisted to get in to meet the management and check for themselves.  The animals are being fed, and actually seem less tormented without the visitors!  The authorities have assured Mona Khalil my colleague, that they have stocks of food to last months.

-For sure you have seen on TV the ‚knights (thugs)‘ that rode in on horses and camels to Tahrir Square the other day.  I was on the streets today in the pyramids area and didn’t see any horses or camels, except a dead horse along the canal road, which is a common site, usually these horses have been ridden to death or hit by cars and their owners don’t have the decency to bury them.

-We, on a personal level are in a continuous struggle to ‚keep afloat‘ at our shelter.  We didn’t have any vets for one week as they were unable to get to the shelter due to road blocks and curfews.  The shelter and the care of  our 600 plus animals was the responsibility of  a few workers who agreed to stay 24/7 at the shelter.  Unfortunately the absence of our vets has resulted in some deaths and serious cases for some of our animals.  We are contunually struggling to  locate/buy food, medicines, pay the rent and the workers salaries, and even find detergents and disinfectants.  We are only able to offer our animals one meal, instead of the usual 2 meals per day.
Some of the  very sick animals will be taken by rented car tomorrow  to an outside vet for x rays, treatment,  and a possible amputation needed for one of the dogs (we have very limited facilities and only one vet ) .  So to sum it up we are in ‚dire straits‘.  Although we have managed to raise some donations from abroad, the banks are still closed.  We have also been reluctant to ask our local sponsors to pay their sponsorship pledges as we understand that they too,  do not have cash, or food at home, food is becoming increasingly difficult to find and everything has shot up in price (even though the Government denies both!).  All the big supermarkets have been closed down (many have been burnt down).  There are very few petrol stations open, in fact ALL the petrol stations along the Cairo/Alex Desert Road, where I live were closed today, and I was lucky enough to find a small one open near the shelter, otherwise this would have meant that I would have only enough petrol to get back today, and no extra to go out again!

I think this pretty much sums up the current situation, we live day by day, not knowing what tomorrow will bring. Pray for us…

Thanks
Susie Nassar
Founding Member
ESMA“