.... In both Muslim and Jewish religious slaughter, the act of slitting the throat "stuns the animal", they add, and "there is no delay between stun and subsequent death".
Animal health experts and campaigners disagree. The RSPCA argues that killing animals without stunning them causes "unnecessary suffering", while activist group Peta calls halal slaughter "prolonged torment", saying the animals "fight and gasp for their last breath, struggling to stand while the blood drains from their necks".
The British Veterinary Association calls for all animals to be effectively stunned before slaughter, while the Farm Animal Welfare Council says cutting an animal's throat is "such a massive injury [that it] would result in very significant pain and distress in the period before insensibility supervenes".
According to The Independent, existing European law requires animals to be stunned before they are slaughtered, but grants exemptions on religious grounds.
The UK has such as exemption in place for both halal and kosher killing, meaning that "there are actually more regulations in place governing the handling of animals that will not be stunned when slaughtered", says the paper.
In 2014, the Danish government joined Switzerland, Sweden, Norway and Iceland in voting to remove this exemption and ban religious slaughter on the ground that "animal rights come before religion". [The Week] Read more
