Special 報告（する）／憶測: evil pet fur 貿易（する）

据えるd conveniently の近くに to the Channel ports, the elegant ベルギー furrier's shop is a magnet for 井戸／弁護士席-heeled British tourists, who are drawn inside by an elegant window 陳列する，発揮する of luxurious coats and stoles.

At a time when fur is making a 復帰 in haute couture circles - with 星／主役にするs such as Madonna defiantly flaunting animal-肌 fashion 従犯者s - 商売／仕事 has rarely been better at the old-設立するd boutique run by Piet vander Eycken.

The bespectacled ベルギー's 豊富な clientele might be いっそう少なく willing to 支える his takings, however, if they knew the 十分な 範囲 of items in his sales 目録.

For, hidden away in a stockroom, behind the racks of mink and sable, are the pelts of dozens of 虐殺（する）d 国内の cats.

They are readily 利用できる in every shade, from ginger tabby, tortoiseshell and marmalade to 深い chocolate brown.

推定では, however, Mr vander Eycken (whose 指名する has been changed for 合法的な 推論する／理由s) keeps these furs out of 見解（をとる） for 恐れる of 原因（となる）ing offence.

Yet when anyone asks 特に for 'cat', he is happy, indeed proud, to parade his wares, as I discovered when I met up with a team from the Humane Society of the 部隊d 明言する／公表するs in a 共同の 調査 into the burgeoning cat and dog fur 貿易（する）.

"I can show you many colours,' he said, thumbing through piles of unmistakably sleek feline pelts, after we asked him to make us a cat 一面に覆う／毛布 - or rheumadecker - which are believed by some on the Continent to be 有益な for arthritis and rheumatism.

"I think these particular ones have been farmed (in Belgium). But I have others that are not from farms. There are places where they catch them. For dogs, it is the same. They are caught and brought to a specialist 学校／設ける and if no one 選ぶs them up they get 発射."

'Cat hunters' at work in London

Not long ago, he said nonchalantly, the 本体，大部分／ばら積みの of his cats were brought by フェリー（で運ぶ） from England.

Ruthless 'cat-hunters ' in London would go around in 先頭s, 一連の会議、交渉／完成するing up pets, and bring them to him for sale (as he spoke I 解任するd how a cat of my own had once 消えるd without trace). Today, they are more likely to be caught in Ghent or Brussels.

Before our 調査 began, the Humane Society had 暴露するd 証拠 that some two million cats and dogs were 存在 killed each year, often by the most 野蛮な methods. But until now, they were believed to 起こる／始まる 排他的に from 中国 and the Far East.

But as Mr vander Eycken chatted to his 顧客s, he unwittingly 供給するd an insight into a more shocking - and hitherto unknown - 面 of the 貿易（する）: that of 内密の cat-fur 農業者s and cat thieves operating in the heart of Europe.

Our ビデオ （映画の）フィート数, 発射 recently during a week-long incognito visit to the furriers of Belgium, was passed to Scottish Euro MP Struan Stevenson and forms the centrepiece of his （選挙などの）運動をする to have the cat and dog fur 貿易（する） banned in Europe, as it has been in the U.S.

Mr Stevenson explained: "We had to 直面する the 主張 that there was no cat or dog farming in the EU or the 10 countries that are about to join, and your film did just that.

"We've had the rugs you bought 実験（する）d microscopically to 確認する they are cat. And 明らかに these cats are 存在 farmed, or collected, on the streets of Belgium, 権利 under the noses of the EU commissioners who sit in their ivory towers and say it is just not happening."

Brussels bureaucrats were 辞退するing to 始める a 禁止（する）, he 追加するd, because the World 貿易（する） Organisation says it is unlawful to 妨げる 貿易（する） on animal 福利事業 grounds. But the sale of cat fur せねばならない be 無法者d under 消費者 詐欺 leglislation, because 製品s were almost always fitted with 誤って導くing labels.

This had been 証明するd when an 捜査官／調査官 visited 中国, where he 提起する／ポーズをとるd as a 可能性のある importer. When he told a Chinese 政府 公式の／役人 who …を伴ってd him that items labelled 'cat' might 原因（となる） offence in the West, the 蜜柑 smiled.

"This is 中国," he replied, "we don't worry about things like that. We'll use whatever label you want.' He then trotted out a 名簿（に載せる）／表（にあげる） of wellused 偽の 指名するs such as ' Mongolian dog' and '中国 wolf'.

In the 冷笑的な, heartless and ruthlessly exploitative secret world of the cat and dog fur 仲買人s, such 策略 are wearily 決まりきった仕事, as the Daily Mail/Humane Society 調査 discovered.

Cat farms operating across the Channel

Although at least one cat farm appears to be operating just across the Channel, the 広大な 大多数 of pelts are collected in the Far East, where there are 得点する／非難する／２０s of smallholdings keeping anything from a handful of cats or dogs to several hundred.

Because they are good-natured, easily-bred and need comparatively little food and husbandry, cats are 特に popular.

They are crammed into small bamboo cages and kept until their pelts are luxuriant and 十分な-sized.

They are then 遂行する／発効させるd in a horrific manner: lassooed with a noose slipped through the cage 妨げる／法廷，弁護士業s and around their necks, then hoisted, meowing and wriggling, until they 落ちる silent. In this way, the pelts - the only thing that 関心s their keepers - are not 損失d.

In one farm, a two-hour flight from Beijing, 捜査官／調査官s filmed more than a dozen cats 存在 garrotted in this way until finally only one was left. Frozen with terror after 証言，証人／目撃するing the death of his companions, he bobbed and weaved his 長，率いる in a frantic - but vain - 成果／努力 to 避ける the noose.

At another farm, in the Philippines, two caged cats were shown hugging one another in the 明らかな knowledge that they were about to die.

"They had seen 20 other cats pulled up and hanged," says Rick Swain, the Humane Society's 長，指導者 捜査官／調査官, who recently exposed the スキャンダル of lamb foetus coats (like the one worn by Madonna) and has led the 全世界の pet fur 調査.

"It's hard to believe that they didn't know what was happening, given the way they behaved.

"They were 十分な-grown cats and they 現実に had their paws around one another. They were 星／主役にするing at the hidden camera 絶対 petrified.

"These weren't farmed cats, they were 逸脱するs 選ぶd up by rustlers. One had a heart-形態／調整d collar so we know it was a family pet."

Farmed dogs are killed with 類似して efficient brutality. Usually they are strung up by the 脚s, then an artery in the thigh is 削減（する） so that they bleed to death. Again, this 避けるs 損失 to their coats.

The 利益（をあげる）s are 広大な. 貧窮化した and ignorant 農業者s will sell their pelts to the tanneries for perhaps £1 or £1.50 each. By the time they are sold in Europe they can fetch 20 or 30 times that 量.

In one 流行の／上流の fur shop, in a small Flemish market town 近づく Antwerp, we were 申し込む／申し出d a Chinese green-tabby cat coat for almost £2,000.

We were 申し込む／申し出d a 12-肌 一面に覆う／毛布 for £220 although some high 質 ones made with up to 80 肌s