Photos: Inditex Donates Thousands of Angora-Wool Clothing Items to Refugees in Iraq

For Immediate Release:

9 October 2015

Contact:

Sascha Camilli +44 (0)20 78376327, ext 235; [email protected]

PHOTOS: INDITEX DONATES THOUSANDS OF ANGORA-WOOL CLOTHING ITEMS TO REFUGEES IN IRAQ

After Signing PETA US’ Angora-Free Pledge, World’s Largest Clothing Retailer Gives Away More Than 30,000 Sweaters and Coats to War Victims

Baghdad – When Inditex, the world’s largest clothing retailer, learned from PETA US that live rabbits’ fur is ripped from their skin on angora farms, it adopted a permanent ban on angora wool. Now, the retailer – whose brands include Zara, Pull & Bear, Massimo Dutti and Bershka – is distributing its remaining stock of more than 30,000 brand-new angora-wool garments to refugee camps in Sulaimaniya and Diyala, Iraq.

Photos of the distribution are available here, here, here and here (photo credit: Ahmad Mousa/Demotix).

“PETA can’t bring back the rabbits who were slaughtered after their fur was ripped or violently cut from their skin, but we can still help those who have lost so much”, says PETA Director Mimi Bekhechi. “Inditex’s gift is providing a little warmth and kindness in a tragedy-stricken corner of our world.”

As revealed in a PETA exposé, some rabbits used for angora scream in pain as their fur is ripped out, while others are cut or sheared and invariably wounded by the sharp tools as they struggle desperately to escape. In addition, the angora-farming industry condemns these intelligent, social animals to years of isolation in small, filthy wire cages.

Inditex is part of a growing list of more than 110 top brands and retailers – including H&M, French Connection, ASOS, Calvin Klein, Stella McCartney and Tommy Hilfiger – that permanently banned angora wool following discussions with PETA US, whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to wear”.

For a complete list of retailers that have ended angora sales, please click here or visit PETA.org.uk for more information.

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