Beijing: Around 100 stray dogs have been buried alive in northern China, triggering a massive online outrage over welfare of animals in the communist country.
A post on Sina Weibo, the Chinese equivalent of Twitter, appealed for help on Wednesday night to save scores of stray dogs trapped in a big pit near a garbage dump in Alxa Left Banner in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.
"Yinchuanshouhuzhedongwuzhijia" or "Home for Stray Animals in Yinchuan", a non-governmental organization (NGO), posted pictures of the dogs in the pit, including a close-up of a baby dog, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.
The photos were taken by a woman, surnamed Tan, who went to the site with five friends on Wednesday to search for a pet dog.
"We saw around a hundred dogs in a pit, but we could not get down into it because it was too deep," Tan said, adding they tried to save the dogs using ropes. They saved over 20.
She said that the dogs must have been in the hole for a long time, because they were thirsty.
A volunteer at the NGO said eight members of the agency went to rescue the dogs on Thursday, only to find the pit had been filled. Several dogs were running around, said the volunteer, without giving her name.
"The pit was five to six-metres deep. We could not dig as we didn't have proper tools," she said.
Another group said a number of dead dogs were retrieved from the pit on Friday.
