The State Duma in the first reading approved a bill that will give regions the authority to kill stray dogs

In the first reading, the State Duma approved amendments to the bill “On the Responsible Treatment of Animals,” according to which regional authorities will be given the authority to decide how to control the number of stray dogs. Information about this is published on the website of the legislative support system.

According to the text of the bill, governors and legislative assemblies plan to be given the authority to establish procedures for the treatment of stray animals on their territories. In particular, the constituent entities of the federation will be able to make decisions on the euthanasia and shooting of stray dogs - in fact, the bill will allow the killing of stray animals. At the same time, during the discussion of the bill in the first readings, writes SOTA , some deputies proposed introducing euthanasia of stray animals within the framework of federal rather than regional legislation.

to the State Duma for consideration The corresponding amendments were submitted on April 12. On April 25 it became known that the government gave a positive response to the bill. “Taking into account the unfavorable situation in a number of constituent entities of the Russian Federation related to the treatment of animals without owners and the need to prevent them from causing harm to the life or health of citizens, the proposed changes seem reasonable and ensure the safety and legitimate interests of citizens,” the government’s review stated.

According to current legislation, it is prohibited to euthanize stray animals or use drugs and medications on them that will lead to injury. The only scheme for handling such animals that is currently permitted is called OSVV: capture - sterilization - vaccination - release. Moreover, if the bill is adopted, regions will be able to act around this scheme - for example, they will euthanize or shoot stray animals.

Opponents of the initiative call the amendments the “euthanasia law”; in many regions they are collecting signatures against the adoption of the bill and going to protests. Animal rights activists, meanwhile, do not rule out that the Russian authorities are deliberately in a hurry - the country is running out of money, and killing animals will help save money for some time.

A federal official familiar with the progress of the approval of the bill told the Agency that if regions get the right to decide for themselves how to treat stray animals, then “this may mean in practice not only shooting, but 90% of this means shooting, which in practice rarely carried out in humane ways.”

Previously, the authorities of several regions of Russia - Bashkortostan , Astrakhan , Saratov, Orenburg and Samara regions, Transbaikal , Krasnoyarsk and Primorsky territories - proposed returning to the practice of shooting and euthanizing stray dogs that behave aggressively.

According to Rospotrebnadzor, from 300 to 400 thousand cases of animal attacks on people are recorded annually, several dozen of them fatal. In March 2023, in the Astrakhan region, stray animals mauled two people to death; in April, in Orenburg, stray dogs attacked an 8-year-old schoolboy, and he died as a result of the incident.