Syrian racing pigeons bred for competitions being smuggled out by breeders

Syrians are trading their beloved and valuable racing pigeons to wealthy Gulf and Lebanese buyers so they can buy food and, some of these birds are worth more than £10,000. These competition class pigeons are specially bred and are smuggled across front lines to Lebanon, where pigeon breeders grab the opportunity to snap up the expensive birds.
This has been reported in dailymail.co.uk dated 16 March 2016.

Syrian breeders were famous for breeding the best pigeons specially bred to take part in competitions that judge the beauty of the birds and some of the collections are valued at an astonishing $1million. However, times are bad and the owners are being forced to part with their much loved pets at throwaway prices to buy food to feed their families.
It seems during the last five years, since the unrest in Syria has started, the Syrians have started to sell their pigeons so they could buy food to eat. The birds were dying in explosions anyway, hence the owners began to send them to Lebanon to sell.
Breeding pigeons used to be a popular Syrian hobby, but it has become yet another cultural casualty of the bloody five year war because ISIS has banned the practice - in their opinion, such practices are activities that distract people from religion. They have stated that the official penalty for breaking the rule is 'financial fine, imprisonment and flogging', and have reportedly killed boys just for feeding their birds.


Image courtesy wikimediacommons.org

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