It is animal cruelty and it's such a shame that there are no laws in Qatar that provide regulations as to how these animals should be housed and transported.

No they are not alright to be like this. The number of animals that die of heatstroke and stress is unbelievable. There are cases where the animals are tied up in the back of pick ups and when the driver brakes suddenly, the animal falls over and is either strangled to death by the rope or the neck is broken.

There was one incident a while ago where a man had a trailer hitched to his car with a dog tied in it. The trailer had low sides and when he braked suddenly, the dog fell out of the trailer and it wasn't until the other drivers got his attention over a km away that he realised he had been driving along dragging his dog under the trailer and it had of course died.

If people stopped seeing them as "just" animals then maybe we would get alot further with animal welfare issues.

www.qaws.org