MADRID -- The annual "running of the bulls" in the northern Spanish town of Pamplona could get some serious competition this year, in the form of a rival run by naked humans protesting cruelty to animals.

Hundreds of animal rights activists rallying in Pamplona in 2004 in a PETA-called protest against traditional bull fighting and bull run that are part of the nine-day San Fermin festival. (AFP/Rafa Rivas)

The People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) group, which has protested against the event in the past, even announced that it was asking the town authorities to replace the traditional bull-chase with its "running of the nudes."

The nine-day San Fermin festival, due to start on July 6, traditionally involves hundreds of runners, including many tourists, trying to outrace a herd of bulls, who chase them throught the town's narrow streets in a tradition that goes back centuries.

But PETA, which last year unleashed several protesters wearing nothing but fake horns and sandals into the streets of Pamplona, said it wants to turn the 'Running of the Nudes' into the official event this year to protest cruelty against animals.

The group is also concerned about last year's outbreak of blue tongue disease, a virus which forced restrictions on livestock movements in southern regions of Spain.

"In light of the outbreak of blue tongue disease and the negative press reports of the disease... we have asked the mayor to make PETA's Running of the Nudes' the official event this year, PETA's campaigns coordinator Yvonne Taylor told AFP.

A spokeswoman for Pamplona mayor Yolanda Barcina Angulo would not comment on PETA's plans, but said that: "as far as we know the bull-running will go ahead as usual" in the absence of advice to the contrary following the blue tongue outbreak.

"People are free to express their own opinion. But the criticism only comes from Britons and Americans, not Spaniards," she sniffed.

PETA tried a celebrity approach last year, with Chrissie Hynde, singer with rock group The Pretenders, urging an end to the "medieval" practice of "tormenting and slaughtering" the bulls, who last year gored 16 race participants.

Amid the controversy the organisers promise only that "the running of the bulls is an unforgettable experience for the spectator and above all for anyone who runs ahead of the bulls.

"It's a spectacle defined by risk and one's physical capacity."

The event has resulted in the deaths of 14 spectators, and of an unknown number of bulls, since records began in 1911.

Copyright © 2005 Agence France Presse

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