Seal hunters return

last updated 8 January 2015

Cap-aux-Meules, Canada

The commercial hunt for baby harp seals has undergone a quiet revival in Canada, The New York Times reported this week. Sales of seal skins collapsed in the 1980s, after animal-rights activists campaigned against seal hunting by airing films of men clubbing white-coated pups to death in the snow. The U.S. and Europe banned seal-fur imports, and Canada sharply limited the hunt. This year the Canadian government decided to allow the killing of 350,000 baby seals, the most in 50 years. The boom has been fueled by new markets in Russia and Poland. Activists responded with a new campaign featuring T-shirts saying, “Club Sandwiches, Not Seals.”