Toro de la Vega remains prohibited

21-03-2019

The cruel feast with bulls known as Toro de la Vega remains prohibited. Since 2016 it is no longer allowed to kill or injure the bull during this event, after a decision by the government of Castile and León. The municipality of Tordesillas appealed for a continuation of this cruel bullfeast, but the Supreme Court in Spain agreed with the state of Castile and León; the ban remains valid.

Toro de la Vega

Traditionally, a bull would be chased and killed by hundreds of men on foot and horseback armed with lances, during the local festivities of Tordesillas, Spain, on the second Tuesday of September.

Regulation
In 2016 the government of Castile and León decided to forbid the death of the bull in public during traditional feasts with bulls in the whole state. In Castile and León there actually is only one festivity during which the bull is killed: Toro de la Vega. However, the law of Castile and León dictates that all bulls used in events must be killed within 24 hours after its use. This means that the bull is no longer killed in public, but later, out of the audience’s sight. Since the prohibition Toro de la Vega is replaced by Toro de la Peña, a bull run in which it is not allowed to injure or kill the bull.

Many long years of campaigning

Since 2006 we have worked with PACMA, and later also with HSI, in the campaign ‘Rompe una lanza’ (break a lance) to get this event forbiden by annually lobbying and protesting in Tordesillas, Valladolid and Madrid. CAS International has spend thousands of euros in this campaign yearly. We also travelled many times to spain with volunteers from the Netherlands and Belgium to show that not only many Spaniards, but also many Europeans do not longer accept this animal abuse. At the start of this campaign, hardly anyone in Spain or abroad knew what happened in Tordesillas on an annual basis. In the past years, more and more organizations and individuals have joined the struggle against this barbarous feast.

Documentary about Toro de la Vega

In September 2015, CAS International travelled with Karen Soeters, founder of the Dutch website about animals and nature Animalstoday.nl, to Tordesillas to film the event undercover (documentary is only in Dutch available):

 

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