A Spanish Parliamentary committee has forged the first bridge across the great divide between humans and animals by passing a resolution this month granting limited rights to great apes – chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas and orangutans. The implications of the resolution are that to kill apes except in self-defense or to torture them in medical experiments or imprison them in circuses, will be outlawed in Spain.

Ingrid Newkirk, founder of the American-based People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), has called the Spanish vote “a great start at breaking down the species barriers, under which humans are regarded as godlike and the rest of the animal kingdom, whether chimpanzees or clams, are treated like dirt.”

Steven Wise, President of the USA-based Center for the Expansion of Fundamental Rights and  author of Rattling the Cage and more recently Drawing the Line, believes the Spanish vote could be the start of the ‘slippery slope” and suggests that granting rights to the great apes will help tear down an arbitrary wall between humans and animals.

Meanwhile, Norm Phelps, author of  “The Longest Struggle” (published by Lantern Books) writes:  "Just as a previous generation had to rid our histories of bias against women and people of color – and expose the wrongs that were being done to them – the generation coming of age today will have to create histories that acknowledge the worth of nonhuman animals and expose the wrongs that have been done to them since the advent of civilization."

Commented Animal Voice editor, Louise van der Merwe: “How short does an ape’s tail have to be before we recognize the ‘brother’ in him? Please see what we are doing to our own indigenous baboons on the petition site.

For the full story on the Spanish vote, go also see:

• New York Times website and
• International Herald Tribune