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Source: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/1380569/Korean-outrage-as-West-tries-to-use-World-Cup-to-ban-dog-eating.html
By Damien McElroy
Last Updated: 2:00AM GMT 06 Jan 2002
AN international campaign led by Brigitte Bardot to use this year's football World Cup to stop the eating of dogs in South Korea has provoked outrage in Asia.
A cross-party group of South Korean MPs has introduced a bill to legalise the sale and export of dog meat, in defiance of international pressure to curtail the custom before the start of the World Cup, which it is co-hosting, in May and June.
The legislation, which is expected to be passed next month, will pitch the authorities into a showdown with international football chiefs, who fear that a row over Asian eating habits will become an unseemly sideshow during the World Cup.
Brigitte Bardot, the French actress turned animal rights activist, has led condemnation of Korean dog-eating, calling it "barbaric". Sepp Blatter, the head of football's governing body, Fifa, which fears that the row could harm its showpiece competition, entered the fray when he urged South Korea to be sensitive to foreign feelings.
Keith Cooper, Fifa's director of communications, said Mr Blatter had only raised the matter after the organisation received thousands of calls and letters condemning the treatment of dogs in Korea. "South Korea's subsequent response is entirely their own business," he said.
Kim Hong-shin, an opposition parliamentarian, said: "Foreign criticism of dog meat reflects lack of understanding of our nation's ancient culture. It is blasphemy, not criticism."
The legislative fightback by 20 MPs from the ruling party and main opposition party proved enormously popular last week on the streets of Seoul. Support, not surprisingly, was strongest among patrons of the 6,000 restaurants that thrive on a mixture of dog stews, soups and satays washed down with alcoholic drinks flavoured with pulverised cat.
The stench and the yelps of caged dogs may be stomach churning, but Lee Wha-jin happily slaps down dishes of dog-meat stew on the white plastic tabletops of his restaurant in the notorious Moran night market in Seoul.
At the rear of shop after shop, eight-month-old puppies - considered to be the prime age for eating - are packed into tiny cages welded together in rows three or four high.
Customers choose which of the live animals they want. The dog is then taken to the back of the shop where a flimsy curtain or a swinging door obscures the sight, but not the sound, of a hideous death.
The sale and consumption of dog meat, third behind beef and pork in Korea, is technically illegal but the authorities turn a blind eye to an industry that aficionados claim has been a part of Korean culture for more than 3,000 years. The bill is intended to legalise what has been a common practice.
To many Koreans, the criticisms of outsiders smack of racism. "We have built our food culture through thousands of years," said Mr Kim, a member of parliament for the opposition Grand National Party. "Criticising us as 'barbarians' for our food culture is tantamount to criticising our culture itself."
A pro-dog meat lobby group accused "self-righteous" Europeans of hypocrisy in singling out dog-eating for opprobrium. "We in Korea do not understand the snail-eating, horse meat-eating Westerners," said the group in a statement.
"None the less, we neither criticise those who enjoy such an unusual diet nor do we demand that they stop eating it."
When the World Cup opens in South Korea on May 31, foreign football fans who find themselves in Moran and other parts of Seoul will be offered a variety of dog dishes, including poshintang, the nation's favourite soup (which literally translates as "body preservation stew"), soo yuck, (dog slices) and jin-guk (dog casserole).
A pound of dog meat can cost up to £3 in Seoul, making it one of the most expensive foods on the local market.
Before arriving in the grim array of cages behind restaurants, most dogs have had to endure the misery of a Korean canine farm hidden in the hills of the countryside. It is not unusual for puppies to grow up 10 to a cage, covered in sores and lice.
It is estimated that more than 50,000 dogs - mostly crosses of the Korean Huang-ju breed but increasingly pedigrees - are killed for commercial purposes each year.
The dogs deaths are as inhumane as their rearing. The majority are beaten to death, as it is thought to stimulate the production of adrenalin that South Korean men believe will bolster their virility.
Once dead, or nearly dead, the dogs are dropped into boiling water, skinned and hung by the jaw from a meat hook. Many cooks then use a blow torch to glaze the carcass.
South Korean dog eaters, like their counterparts in China and Vietnam, where the dishes are also extremely popular, believe that the meat contains medicinal properties.
A curb on restaurants serving dog meat, such as the one that preceded the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games, would bring forth protests from many Koreans against a "national capitulation". Mr Lee said: "As long as dog meat makes people healthy, the government should not try to ban it to pacify Westerners."
Bardot has threatened to distribute pictures showing horrific treatment of dogs bred for food during the World Cup. Outraged South Koreans have responded with thousands of abusive telephone and e-mail messages to her foundation and by bombarding French companies in Seoul with angry calls.
Even dog lovers in Korea approve of the Bill, believing that it will spare many animals from cruelty. Song Seok-chan, the government MP behind the Bill, claims that the new regulations would ensure that only officially licensed abattoirs would be allowed to handle dog meat production.
British animal rights campaigners, however, reject claims that the proposed legislation would improve treatment of the dogs.
"We would oppose any legalisation of the practice as we believe there is no recognised humane method of killing them," said an RSPCA spokesman.
"There is also the fear that legalisation would increase consumption of dog meat and therefore result in more welfare problems."
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I am very 
and disgusted.