Press council gives right to animal rights activist
The Press Council has approved a complaint by animal rights activist Erwin Kessler against the Tages-Anzeiger. It found a violation of the duty of truth and correction. The article was about slaughtering and butchering.
Under the title "New rules for the license to kill," the Tages-Anzeiger reported on December 1, 2010, about a change in the animal protection ordinance. The article stated, among other things: "No animal may be slaughtered without prior stunning in Switzerland - unlike in the EU, which allows Jews and Muslims to kill ritually without stunning."
Erwin Kessler of the Verein gegen Tierfabriken Schweiz (VgT) then wrote a letter to the editor of the Tages-Anzeiger pointing out that the ritual slaughter of chickens was indeed permitted in Switzerland. Since the Tages-Anzeiger refused to publish the letter to the editor, Kessler filed a complaint with the Press Council.
The latter found in a statement of April 15 that the Tages-Anzeiger had indeed violated the "Declaration of the Duties and Rights of Journalists". The daily newspaper would have been obliged to correct the false report.
The report is about how animals may be killed or slaughtered in Switzerland according to animal protection legislation. The statement that no animals may be slaughtered without stunning in Switzerland is wrong.
The fact that chickens may be slaughtered in Switzerland is not an irrelevant secondary aspect in the overall context of the article - even if the proportion of animals killed in this way is small. (SDA)
