Hundreds of dead birds litter the streets of Rome after an unofficial fireworks show that lit up the sky on New Year’s Eve – a scene animal rights activists called a “massacre”.
“It could be that they died of fear,” Lordana DiGlio, a spokesman for the International Organization for the Protection of Animals, told the Associated Press.
“They can fly together and knock against each other, or hit windows or electric power lines,” DiGlio said. “Let’s forget that they can even die of a heart attack.”
Residents in the Italian capital set off fireworks despite a 10am curfew due to the city’s ban on demonstrations and the Coronavirus epidemic – but both were ignored by many locals.
Diglio said that fireworks disturb or injure wild and domestic animals every year, and that the Italian branch of the IOPA had banned the sale of colored explosives for personal use because of the danger to the animals.
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