DOLPHIN CAPTIVITY CONCERNS GROW IN CYPRUS

Dolphins don't belong in captivity

In spite of Cyprus being a popular holiday spot, you will not see any so-called dolphinariums here. ARC’s (Animal Responsibility Cyprus) successful campaign resulted in the banning of the importation of cetaceans to this country. 

Cyprus used to have a dolphinarium, the Ayia Napa Marine Park, located in the main tourist resort. In 1994, the Park imported four Black Sea bottlenose dolphins and two sea lions supplied from the Russian Academy of Science *. 

In 1997, a Ministerial decree was passed prohibiting cetacean shows and the use of cetaceans for commercial purposes. Finally, after the decree came into force in 1999, the Ayia Napa Marine Park closed down and subsequent applications to open captive dolphin shows were refused by the authorities. Unfortunately the closure of the marine park came too late for the four Black Sea bottlenose dolphins who all met their deaths by 1998, four years after being imported into Cyprus. The marine park never published any form of scientific papers on the research it claimed it was undertaking and it seemed the attraction’s sole purpose was the entertainment of tourists.

This month (July 2014) Animal Party Cyprus - APC (Fb) has expressed concern over apparent plans for a dolphin park. In an announcement, the party said Agriculture Minister Nicos Kouyialis had in recent statements to the media "more or less said foreign investor applications for the licensing of a dolphin park in Cyprus are being seriously considered." Animal Party Cyprus said this was a negative development since the country has already rejected these activities in the past, with a Cabinet decision completely disallowing these types of entertainment activities and forbidding the import of any dolphins or cetaceans in general. 

According to Whale and Dolphin Conservation (Fb) concerns over potential plans continue to grow and no educational reasons can justify a new dolphinarium, as most of the knowledge gained from carrying out research in the captive environment may not be applicable to the conservation of these animals in the wild. Whales and dolphins are ordinarily intelligent, social animals that live in groups in the wild and carry out a myriad of tasks throughout daily life that are simply impossible in captivity. 

 Please, sign up this petition and tell the president of the Republic of Cyprus, Mr. Nikos Anastasiadis, to abandon all plans for this tourist attraction. To follow the new Fb page No Captive Dolphins in Cyprus go at https://www.facebook.com/NoCaptiveDolphinsInCyprus.

*THE DOLPHIN TRADERS: An Investigation into the World-wide Trade and Export of Black Sea bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus) from the Ukraine and Russia, 1990 - 1997 -- A Report for the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society -- May 1998: http://www.eurocbc.org/dolphintraders.pdf / http://www.wdcs.org/submissions_bin/thedolphintraders.pdf / 

 Εμπόριο δελφινιών στην Μαύρη Θάλασσα:  http://atticaparkdolphinarium.blogspot.gr/p/blog-page.html / Dolphins of the Black Sea: on.fb.me/1mymQLy / http://on.fb.me/Mcozkc /  on.fb.me/U8Elqu