Calls for ban on holiday adverts with elephant rides and circuses

Exclusive: Theresa May and Michael Gove face demands to curb brutality and prevent species extinction

A new drive is being launched for a ban on adverts for foreign holidays that involve rides or live shows with elephants.

Campaigners and celebrities will hand in a petition to Downing Street next week, calling on Theresa May to take the step to protect the endangered Asian elephant from the suffering caused by the tourism industry.

Large numbers of tourists visiting India, Thailand and other countries in southeast Asia pay to ride or trek with elephants, wash them or visit circuses featuring them, but the prolonged brutality to which the animals are subjected to to force them to comply with human activities is hidden from view.

Experts believe the suffering meted out to them drives them literally mad and also endangers the population.

The Independent this year exposed how British tour giants are still promoting holidays where tourists can join in experiences where elephants are chained and prodded with sharp implements so they behave as instructed out of fear of pain.

Campaigners say self-regulation by the UK holiday industry has failed to curb the abuse or stop tormented elephants breaking free and rampaging.

The Independent also revealed how India’s temple elephants are chained, beaten and whipped over their lifetimes for the annual festival season.

Many are malnourished and die of intestinal complications as a result of being given the wrong type of food. But India’s system of insurance for those that succumb ensures owners have no incentive to properly care for them.

Members of Save the Asian Elephants (Stae), together with actress Evanna Lynch, who starred as Luna Lovegood in the Harry Potter franchise, are presenting a petition of 200,000 signatures and an open letter to Ms May, calling for:

• The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) to support a new law to ban the advertising or promotion in or from the UK of unethical Asian elephant-related holidays abroad 
• Theresa May to honour the government’s 2015 election manifesto pledge to “support the Indian government in its efforts to protect the Asian elephant”
• Ms May and environment secretary Michael Gove to begin talks with India’s leader Narendra Modi to end the beating of baby elephants to “break their spirits” and to restore the proper treatment of captive elephants
• The government to pressure India to release captive elephants to protected forests or genuine sanctuaries and to help establish a model elephant sanctuary, as well as a training centre for mahouts (drivers) and veterinary exchanges between the two countries to raise standards of care

The pressure group also wants the Association of British Travel Agents to press its members to advertise only genuine elephant sanctuaries or wildlife reserves where elephants are observed from a distance, with no rides, trekking, chains, costumes, festivals or circus tricks

At the same time, the charity World Animal Protection has compiled a list of five of the best ethical elephant venues to visit, based on its worldwide research.

The Stae activists also have the support of Peter Egan, who starred in Downton Abbey, Ever Decreasing Circles and Hold the Sunset.

Ms Lynch said: “I want everyone to know of the cruelty and suffering endangered Asian elephants go through due to misinformed holidaymakers paying for elephant entertainments at many tourist attractions. People wrongly assume the elephants are trained humanely. “So often they have no idea the Asian elephant species is threatened with extinction.”

We must stop the ruthless treatment of these sentient creatures who feel pain, suffering, terror and loneliness in captivity

Harry Potter star Evanna Lynch

Captive elephants are often poached from the wild when they are calves to be “trained” for attractions such as giving rides, festivals, circuses, parades and working at temples.

Witnesses said each animal is isolated in a wooden “crushing” cage, starved, sleep-deprived, hit with iron bars, planks and spikes, and beaten into submission. This “pajan” process is so violent it is believed more than half of the young elephants die during or after it.

Their ankles often become painfully infected from where they have been chained.

The torment can lead elephants to attack tourists, sometimes fatally. Duncan McNair, chief executive of Stae, said he believed it was illegal not to warn tourists of the dangers they face.

The letter to Downing Street calls for the government to step in (Save the Asian Elephants)

“I’ve yet to meet anyone in the west who thinks it’s a good idea to beat and torture baby elephants,” he told The Independent.

He said although they were expecting some resistance from those with a vested commercial interest, the huge support for an advertising ban made it an obvious step to take.

David Cameron promised in 2015 to help India improve elephant welfare and now that time is running out the Brexit talks should not stand in the way of government action, Mr McNair said.

“Some ministers say a great majority of 52 per cent voted for Brexit but in this, 89 per cent backed urgent action. We’ll be talking to Labour about this too. The Conservatives must not have their clothes stolen on it. I would be deeply shocked if we didn’t get a positive response from Michael Gove.”

Asian elephants have been on the IUCN Red List of endangered species since 1986 after the population plummeted from millions in the late 19th century to fewer than 40,000 worldwide, of which one in four is captive.

The letter to Ms May says: “This wondrous, ancient species now stands in our lifetime exhausted, beaten and broken, at the end of its long journey, on the very precipice of its existence. Your influence and that of your Defra secretary of state could now yield results to announce to international acclaim at this October's lllegal Wildlife Trade conference in London, and to show UK global leadership, before it is too late.”

A poll for Save the Asian Elephants, taken in June, found 89 per cent of people believed the pajan training for the tourism industry was unjustified and 87 per cent would avoid a tourist experience if they discovered the elephants had been treated badly.

As well as the 200,000-strong petition, another 2.6 million people have signed similar petitions against the cruelty.

The new campaign is being launched to coincide with World Elephant Day next Sunday.

A Defra spokesperson said protecting elephants was a government priority, adding: “We take the plight of Asian elephants seriously, which is why we recently met Save the Asian Elephants to discuss what more we can do. The Illegal Wildlife Trade Conference in London later this year will offer us a chance to discuss what action can be taken to support these majestic animals.”