Sacred Bull With TB Killed in Britain*

By JIM HEINTZ
The Associated Press
Friday, July 27, 2007; 5:12 AM

LONDON -- A sacred bull seized from a Hindu monastery in Wales because
he tested positive for tuberculosis has been slaughtered, officials said
Friday.

The plight of Shambo the bull had attracted international attention
since his diagnosis this spring and prompted an Internet campaign by the
Skanda Vale monastery to save him. Hindus revere cattle and said killing
the bull would violate their religious rights.

More than 100 devout Hindus and their supporters prayed and chanted
outside the bull's paddock throughout Thursday, but animal health
officials and police led Shambo from the monastery to a trailer at
around 7:30 p.m. A Webcam site, dubbed Moo Tube, which the monastery set
up to show the flower-garlanded bull in his paddock, broadcast images of
an empty, hay-lined shrine.

"I can confirm he has been put down," said a spokesman for the Welsh
Assembly, the regional government. The spokesman, speaking on condition
of anonymity in line with government policy, did not specify how Shambo
was killed.

Swami Suryananda, one of Shambo's caretakers, said officials had
"committed the most violent and ignorant act of desecration of our
temple and destroyed an innocent life."

"The perpetrators of this act will suffer the consequences of their
actions for generations to come," he said.

A veterinary official and police officers had come for Shambo on
Thursday morning, but left after monks would not let them past the gates
of the remote monastery, about 230 miles west of London. They returned
hours later with a warrant, which they posted to the door.

About 20 police officers later entered the temple, wading through a
crowd of more than 100 supporters who had gathered in front of the
bull's paddock to pray and chant.

They cut a chain securing the gates, dragged away some of the
worshippers who refused to leave, and loaded the bull into a trailer.

Police officers flanking the trailer removed their helmets, and some
worshippers called out "Bye, Shambo" as the bull was driven away.

Authorities said no one was hurt and there were no arrests.

"It's bad, but I don't blame the police because they were friendly and
they did their duty," said one of the protesters, Verena Blum.

Regulations stipulate that cattle suspected of carrying bovine
tuberculosis be slaughtered; the disease can be spread to other cattle,
to deer and in rare cases to humans.

Hindus took the government to court to prevent Shambo's slaughter. The
monastery argued that it could keep Shambo isolated to prevent the TB
spreading, or that it could take the bull to India. The monastery said
authorities had refused both options.

Last week, a Welsh judge ordered local authorities to reconsider their
decision to kill the bull. But the Court of Appeal in London reversed
that decision Monday, ruling that killing him would be justified to
prevent the disease's spread.

Some people in Britain supported the bull's seizure. Keith Porteous
Wood, director of the National Secular Society, claimed Shambo's
supporters were "putting religious dogma before the welfare of the
community."

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Associated Press writer Tariq Panja in London contributed to this report.

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On the Net:

Moo Tube: http://www.skandavale.org.uk/webcam.htm