Pamplona: Protesters make a stand
Hundreds of protesters, some wearing just thongs and plastic bull horns, have marched through Pamplona to protest against the centuries-old running of the bulls, Spain's best known fiesta.
Each morning during the week-long San Fermin festival, six bulls are set loose on an 825-metre course through the city's cobbled streets leading to the bull ring where they face a bullfighter's sword in an evening fight.
Hundreds of adrenalin and alcohol-fuelled aficionados crowd the course to follow the tradition of running with the half tonne beasts.
But protesters say tradition is not a justification.
"It's wrong to kill and its certainly wrong to torture," said Stella of Wales's Cynwyl Elfed, a woman in her seventies wearing just knickers and strategically placed tape. "It is really sick to enjoy torture."
Tens of thousands of tourists, particularly the United States and Australia, come each year to the July 6-14 festival made famous by Ernest Hemingway's 1920s tale of passion and drinking "The Sun also Rises".
Wearing only underwear
Local authorities do not allow protesters to march naked, as they did once in 2002. This year many wore only their underwear, and many had slogans written across their buttocks in temporary tattoos and painted mottos on each other in body paint.
The protest's organisers - People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) - said 700 marched. Police said there were 500 to 600.
Australian veterinarian Andrew Knight, who came to Pamplona from Perth for the protest, wore just a thong and running shoes.
"Bullfighting is one of the last public festivals involving pure public cruelty in the world," the 34-year-old said.
Banners in several languages called for bullfighting to be banned. When protesters reached the bull ring they called a minute of silence for the bulls which would die this week.
Dozens of locals in Pamplona, a more conservative city than many parts of Spain, lined the route to see the march, some in support, others were against it.
"If I were in the police's position, I wouldn't allow it," Francisco, a 60-year-old retired resident of Pamplona said. "What does she think she's doing?" he said, pointing to a nearly bare protester.
"There are lots of small children about."
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