What Next?

• forcing the Dutch government to close the only known chimpanzee laboratory in the European Union, situated within the Biomedical Primate Research Centre (BPRC) in Rijswijk, the Netherlands.

• ensuring that all the BPRC chimpanzees were transferred to sanctuaries or special zoos.

• securing a legal ban on the use of great apes in research in the Netherlands.

During 2007 PACE worked alongside NAVS and Animal Defenders International to lobby MEPs to sign Written Declaration 40/2007 which urges the European Commission and the European Parliament to pass legislation banning the use of apes and of wild-caught monkeys in laboratory experimentation. Due to our efforts 433 MEPs (well over the half required) signed up and the proposal has now entered the next stage of the legislative process. However the momentum and the pressure must be maintained through 2008 or the motion risks falling by the wayside.