Warsaw dolphin aquarium meets criticism

The country’s first dolphin aquarium is to be constructed in the outskirts of Warsaw, in the town of Mszczonów. The planned entertainment center housing maritime species is to be completed by 2017. The official purpose of establishing the aquarium is dolphin therapy.

Animal rights activists, meanwhile, believe the concept is archaic and goes against modern-day standards of keeping wild animals.

“The dolphinarium would set a dangerous precedent and would place Poland in an uncomfortable position as regards states which are shifting away from the exploitation of circus animals – and this is the role dolphins would play in Mszczonów,” warns WWF Polska in its communique.

Keeping the animals in artificial brine in concrete or plastic containers for commercial purposes should not take place, actvisit Katarzyna Pietrasik, from WWF, told website WawaLove.

Zoologists also indicate that the mammals, which explore their surrounding and communicate through echolocation, suffer immensely from living in an artificial environment.

“They’re like a human locked for life in a room full of mirrors,” Agnieszka Siergel, from the Institute of Environmental Protection at the Polish Academy of Sciences told Wawalove. (rg)