Turkey plans to regulate a large stray dog population, raising some fears about mass killings

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — A Turkish bill aimed at regulating the country's millions of stray dogs moved closer to becoming law Wednesday as animal rights advocates feared many of them would be killed or end up in neglected, overcrowded shelters.

“Although some people persistently ignore it, Turkey has a stray dog problem,” President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose ruling party proposed the bill, told legislators after a parliamentary committee approved the bill late Tuesday. The full assembly will have a final vote in the coming days.

The government estimates that around 4 million stray dogs roam Turkey’s streets and rural areas. Although many are harmless, a growing number are congregating in packs, and numerous people have been attacked in Istanbul and elsewhere. The country's well-known large stray cat population is not a focus of the bill.

Erdogan noted that stray dogs “attack children, adults, elderly people and other animals. They attack flocks of sheep and goats, they cause traffic accidents.”

The proposed legislation mandates that municipalities collect stray dogs and house them in shelters where they would be neutered and spayed. Dogs that are in pain, terminally ill, pose a health risk to humans or are aggressive would be euthanized.

Municipalities would be required to build dog shelters or improve conditions in existing ones by 2028. Mayors who fail to meet their responsibilities in controlling stray dogs would face imprisonment of six months to two years. Fines on people who abandon pets would be raised from 2,000 lira ($60) to 60,000 lira ($1,800).

Animal rights activists worry that some municipalities might kill dogs on the pretext that they are ill, rather than allocate resources to shelter them.

“Since there are not enough places in the shelters — there are very few shelters in Turkey — a path has been opened for the killing (of strays),” said veterinarian Turkan Ceylan. “We animal rights activists know very well that this spells death.”

Ceylan maintained that the dogs are at risk of contracting diseases in shelters and in vehicles used to round up strays. “No animal that enters the shelter comes out healthy,” she said.

Existing regulations require stray dogs to be caught, neutered and spayed and returned to where they were found. But a failure to implement those regulations has caused the dog population to explode, animal rights groups say. They argue that proper implementation of the existing regulations would be sufficient to control the population.

The government denies the bill would lead to a widespread culling. Justice Minister Yilmaz Tunc told journalists on Wednesday that anyone killing strays “for no reason” would be punished.

Meanwhile the main opposition party, which won key municipalities in local elections in March, asserts that Erdogan's government would use the law to target opposition mayors.

Murat Pinar, who heads an association campaigning for measures to keep the streets safe from stray dogs, says at least 75 people, including 44 children, were killed as a result of attacks or by traffic accidents caused by dogs since 2022. That's the year his 9-year-old daughter, Mahra, was run over by a truck after she fled from two aggressive dogs.

During public meetings last week on the bill, representatives of some nongovernmental groups were prevented from observing the proceedings. Activists have gathered in parks demanding that what they call the “massacre law” be withdrawn.

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Ayse Wieting in Istanbul contributed.