Hatem Yavuz is only Supporter Left of Namibia's Seal Murder

hatemyavuz@superonline.com, info@yavuzgrup.com

Yavuz Group Australia
Hatem Yavuz
4/43 A Ethel St. Seaforth N.S.W.
Sydney, Australia

Yavuz Group Turkey
Hatem Yavuz
Organize Deri Sanayi Boelgesi 11 Yol B-1 Parsel
Tuzla, Istanbul


Dear Hatem Yavuz of Australia,

Sometimes a business needs to look beyond projected revenue, to consider moral implications. Citizens worldwide overwhelmingly oppose Namibia's annual seal massacre, yet you at Hatem Yavuz as sole purchaser of Cape Fur Seal skins apparently supports it!! Association with a seal cull that has surpassed Canada in scope and cruelty generates negative publicity.

Brutalized seals are so young, mother's milk gushes from their knife wounds. Utter terror may cause pups to regurgitate milk even before they are clubbed. After several blows with a wooden club, pups presumed dead are "bled out" with a knife. Some remain conscious till partially skinned.

I respectfully ask you to boycott Cape Fur Seal pelts and thereby thwart the only hunt that permits clubbing of nursing pups. Seal fur jackets and medicinal oils are ethically indefensible. I am confident a businessman with your acumen can tap other lucrative resources that don't invest in this bloody trade.

The sealskin market is shriveling amid an economic slump and passage of a European Union ban on all non-aboriginal seal goods. Belgium, the Netherlands, Slovenia, Croatia, South Africa, the U.S. and Mexico already prohibit seal products. Cape fur seal imports were specifically banned across the EU in 2009. Yavuz Group, an exclusive buyer of baby pelts in 2008, seems to be the primary incentive for an otherwise dead-end industry.

Namibia's seal population has endured massive depletion due to starvation. Thus, claims from the Ministry of Fisheries that bludgeoning and slashing nursing pups is crucial to population control ring false. The cull itself excludes breeding seals. Moreover, natural cycles within ecosystems level populations. South Africa, for example, has observed no rise in seal numbers since ending its commercial cull in 1990.

Please heed global disapproval and end your endorsement of seal slaughter. I urge you to publicly pledge to stop buying Namibian Cape Fur Seal pelts.

Yours sincerely,