Click to read the article in Turkish
Releasing a joint statement on March 3 World Wildlife Day, 234 civil society organizations from Turkey have stated that their struggle for the protection of wildlife is now bearing fruit after two years.
The organizations have underlined the importance of public sensitivity expressed for the suspension of tenders opened for shooting living beings as part of hunting tourism in several places across Turkey.
Accordingly, they have called on nature lovers to join the campaign on change.org/vurmabeni and to take action to defend life.
Noting that several hunting tenders in a series of provinces of Turkey from Eskişehir to Antalya, from Ankara to Tunceli have been halted thanks to the lawsuits filed by nature lovers and the related institutions, the organizations' call for the campaign briefly reads as follows:
'We share life in this world'
"We, 229 civil society organizations, came together to say that there cannot be any sports, tourism, hobby or tender for killing any other living being! We are talking about other living beings with which we are sharing life in this world; they are our neighbours far away and close.
"We object to the Central Hunting Commission and its decisions reducing our neighbours to numbers and quotas.
"The Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry should take decisions that protect living beings instead of deciding on how many living beings will be killed under which conditions and where.
"In the last 16 years, there have been 17 thousand hunting courses opened and nearly 500 thousand people have received a hunting certificate.
"Institutions that are responsible for protecting nature unfortunately sit back and watch how the weapons industry and hunters destroy our nature, and even worse, they encourage it.
'Turkey pledged to protect endangered species'
"Yet, Turkey has pledged to protect endangered species in accordance with the articles 6 and 8 of The Convention on Biological Diversity which it is a party to. However, ignoring these clauses and the clauses of other international agreements that we are a party to and that are considered as legislations of our country, even some endangered species are being allowed to be hunted. This cannot be accepted!
'These decisions will destroy our nature'
"Moreover, due to an appendix to the Article 15 of the Legislative Proposal passed in the Grand National Assembly of Turkey's Commission of Agriculture, Forestry and Rural Affairs on July 1, 2020, it has been accepted with a majority of votes to make a legislation to allow foreign diplomats and 'senior guests' to hunt free of charge if they wish and also to allow the hunting of animals such as bears and boars coming to residential areas as a result of the destruction of their habitats.
"These decisions that will destroy our nature day by day have to be cancelled. We demand that the Terrestrial Hunting Law is immediately modified and amended in the form of Nature Conservation Law and that specialized courts of nature are established.
'Time to be a voice of all living beings'
"Now, it is time to be the voice of all living beings that are deprived of their right to live and their habitats. Because the right to live is the most natural, non-negotiable right for all living beings. The lives of all of us are interconnected. We become the voice of all living beings who cannot defend themselves with human language.
"Ban All Hunting!" (EMK/SD)
