In response to recent media reports that the planned killing of baboons at Nuremberg Zoo is expected to take place today, Paulina Kuhn, wildlife officer at the German Animal Welfare Federation, commented:
"The killing of healthy Guinea baboons at Nuremberg Zoo is cruel and ethically unjustifiable. The zoo is breaking a taboo that will have consequences: We, as the German Animal Welfare Federation, will file a criminal complaint for violation of the Animal Welfare Act. The responsibility for animals kept and bred in zoos does not end where it becomes spatially, financially, or organizationally inconvenient. The argument of species conservation falls short: there are neither concrete conservation goals nor prospects for reintroduction into the wild for the guinea baboons. The purpose of conservation breeding is questionable if the “reserve population” can only live in the zoo anyway, while their habitats continue to shrink."
Further information can be found in the press release issued by the German Animal Welfare Federation on July 17, 2025: German Animal Welfare Federation calls for a change of course: “The zoo concept is reaching its limits!”
