CAS International, PACMA, and Humane Society International have collected 71,000 signatures against the traditional feast of Toro de la Vega.
On June 19, this petition was presented to Pablo Trillo-Figueroa, Deputy of the Governing Council of Valladolid.
QCA has joined campaigns against this event for several years now and previous reports can be seen in the Archive.
During the annual Toro de la Vega, in Tordesillas in the province of Castilla y León, a bull, bought by the town council and named, is released and pursued by a crowd of people on foot and on horseback. The animal is repeatedly stabbed with spears till death follows.
Animal Party of Spain, PACMA. www.pacma.es
This tradition is very controversial in Spain due to the extreme suffering that the bull must undergo and many Spaniards believe that the event should be banned. Many lovers of bullfighting even openly speak out against this tradition. Toro de la Vega was declared an event of ‘national tourist interest’ in 1980 and was recognized by the Council of Valladolid as ‘cultural heritage’ in 2011.
CAS International, together with the Spanish political party PACMA and HSI, launched the campaign Rompe una Lanza – Break a Lance – symbolising the weapons used against the bull – with the purpose of drawing attention widely to the subject and to gather signatures against this cruel tradition.
This year’s event will most likely be on Tuesday September 11 – the municipality is capable of changing dates to make protests more difficult. If this is the case, the protest will be on Sunday September 9.
Thanks to Estefanía Pampín Zuidmeer and CAS International for this information.
CAS International (Comité Anti Stierenvechten)
P.O. Box 1312
3500 BH Utrecht, The Netherlands.
http://www.cas-international.org – in several languages
~ QCA: More information on the campaign will appear as it arrives.
In the interim, we have written, as we have in previous years, to the mayor of Tordesillas, the president of the regional government of Castilla y León, and to the organising body of the event, the Patronato del Toro de la Vega.
We have also – new this year – written to the priests of the Tordesillas churches, asking for a change of heart on their support of this terrible cruelty.
However, the Toro de la Vega is organised in veneration of the patron saint of Tordesillas, the Virgen de la Pena. This year’s bull is called Volante – he is in effect sacrificed in the name of the Virgin Mary.