The Turkish Parliament approved a new animal protection law on Tuesday that aims to round up millions of stray dogs and put them into shelters.
Under the legislation proposed by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party), municipalities will have to get the strays off the streets and into shelters. Any dogs that “present a danger to the life or health of people and animals, display uncontrollable negative behavior, have a contagious or incurable disease or whose adoption is forbidden” will be put down.
An initial version of the bill included an article calling to euthanize dogs that are in pain, terminally ill, posing a health risk or too aggressive to be controlled. The term was removed in the final draft that passed at 600-seat Parliament with 275 to 224 voting in favor of it. The law is to take effect after being published in the Official Gazette.
Critics of the bill claimed it seeks to indiscriminately cull the canine population, while proponents argued its necessity amid rising fatal attacks by aggressive dogs, especially on children and the elderly.
The final draft underwent several amendments following the controversy, including changing the definition of “owned” and “ownerless” animals, as well as animal shelters.
Under previous legislation, municipalities had to neuter and vaccinate all street dogs and leave them where they were found following treatment.
The law requires animals in shelters to be registered in the database of the Agriculture and Forestry Ministry and rehabilitated dogs to be housed in shelters until they are adopted, amending a previous clause that included cats and other street animals.
The law increases the ministry’s budget for stray animals and upholds practices like denigrating dogs, digital identification and chipped monitoring.
The population of street dogs in Türkiye is estimated to be 4 million, and municipalities have neutered around 2.5 million in the past 20 years, according to the draft bill. The animals are often taken care of by neighborhood residents and treated like pets.
According to the bill, there are currently 322 animal shelters with a capacity for 105,000 dogs.
Municipalities must now spend at least 0.3% of their annual budget on animal rehabilitation services and building shelters.
Municipalities will be given time until 2028 to build new shelters and improve current shelters, the law says.
The legislation also bans abandoning stray animals anywhere outside a shelter or releasing a dog from a shelter, aiming to ensure that municipalities completely fulfill their duties as stipulated by this law.
The main opposition party, the Republican People’s Party (CHP), led efforts to block the bill, claiming it was a “law of murder” and “against the Constitution."
CHP lawmakers’ attitude toward families of dog attack victims during the earlier debate at Parliament and controversial demonstrations by a group calling themselves "animal rights activists" at Parliament drew the ire of the government, too.
CHP leader Özgür Özel on Tuesday said his party would go to the Constitutional Court to overturn the bill.
Speaking to reporters after the law passed, he said: “In light of vaccinated dogs posing a barrier between wildlife and urban living against diseases like rabies, a great risk was taken regarding public health. We will seek to halt the law’s enforcement.”
AK Party parliamentary group Chair Abdullah Güler pointed out similar euthanasia practices in the U.S. and the U.K. regarding animals that weren’t adopted.
“This law doesn’t include killing. It includes adoption and incentives,” he said, adding that the draft was shaped by reports from the World Health Organization (WHO), the ministry, academics, animal rights activists and the loved ones of stray dog attacks.
Erdoğan himself has defended the bill while lashing out at the opposition for exploiting the issue, saying the bill helps Türkiye keep streets safer for people amid growing dog attacks.
