Animal Rights Activist Paul McCartney Calls For End Of Commercial Sea Hunt; Former Beatle Says ‘Seals Are Dying A Horrible Death For Their Fur'

Paul McCartney was never the political Beatle. He may have spilled the beans to the journalists about the Beatles' use of LSD and asked Britain to "Give Ireland Back To the Irish," but McCartney always lived his principals more than he wrote about them. Paul treated his late wife Linda as a musician and more than a "Cook of the House," while John Lennon was vocal about inequality. But McCartney has always been a fervid animal rights activist, supporting PETA and never eating food that "had a face."

The former Beatles bassist is again calling for an end to the commercial seal hunt off Canada's East Coast. McCartney wants to stop the "senseless slaughter" ahead of this year's seal hunt. The hunt opened Sunday off northeastern Newfoundland. McCartney previously joined activists at Humane Society International (HSI) on the ice in 2006.

Anti-sealing campaigns have fostered bans on seal product imports in the European Union, the United States and Mexico and other countries.

"Their videos of the bloody seal slaughter provide the only vital evidence to demonstrate year after year that these seals are dying a horrible death for their fur," McCartney said in a statement released Tuesday by Humane Society International. "Canada's brutal commercial seal hunt has begun, and once again thousands of baby seals will be shot and bludgeoned to make fur products that nobody wants or needs."

"The European Union's trade ban on commercial seal hunt products has already helped save more than one million baby seals from a horrible fate, but we need to ensure the EU keeps this strong ban intact. That's why my friends at Humane Society International are once again setting out for the ice flows for the grim task of catching this horror on film," the statement continued.

"Their videos of the bloody seal slaughter provide the only vital evidence to demonstrate year after year that these seals are dying a horrible death for their fur. As HSI bears witness to this cruelty, I wish them well and hope that this will be the last year that Canada's ice turns red."

Canada's federal government defended the commercial seal hunt as being humane and sustainable.

"We continue to tell the truth about sealing, and the effects of seal populations on our marine ecosystems, to combat misleading attacks on the hunt from radical animal rights activists," Fisheries Minister Gail Shea said in a statement. "We've challenged the EU's unfair ban on Canadian seal products, and are working with industry and our international partners to develop new products and open new markets," she said.

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Paul Mccartney
The Beatles
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