The dogs removed from the animal “kennel” are planned to be sold

When inspecting the kennel, the Food and Veterinary Service admitted that the keeping conditions were unsuitable for dogs, the aviaries were muddy. Uncontrolled reproduction of animals has also taken place; therefore, the legality of issuing dog pedigrees is also questionable.

On March 19, the Food and Veterinary Service removed the dogs from the animal kennel “Lieldeviņzare” due to violations of animal welfare requirements and long-term non-prevention of the identified violations.

It took almost two weeks to find temporary homes for so many dogs, because it turned out that the state has no money to keep these animals in shelters.

“In normal situations, we hand over the animals to the State Security Agency, which also pays someone for keeping these animals. In this case, since there was a large number of animals, unfortunately, the State Security Agency also does not have the money to pay for it. Therefore, we turned to shelters that would be willing to keep these animals for free until they are sold,” explained Mairita Riekstiņa, head of the Veterinary Facility Monitoring Department of PVD.

The State Security Agency emphasized that after a few weeks, the shelters that took care of the dogs will be offered to buy them at a price determined by the agency’s evaluation commission.

“It must be understood that the keeping of each dog is an expense. According to the contracts we have concluded, it starts at three euros per day. It turns out that it could already be 10 thousand euros per month. We informed PVD about these costs. The regulatory framework provides, that if long-term storage of the property causes losses, then the official decides to hand it over for realization or destruction. In this case, PVD has decided on the realization of these dogs,” explained Raivis Mālijs, head of the Department of Seizures of the State Security Agency.

Animal protection societies stated that there would be no such problems with the removed dogs if both shelters and animal breeders had the same requirements from the state.