By Richard Spencer
Telegraph
Published 19/06/2006

The incipient animal rights movement in China scored an unlikely victory at the weekend when it invaded a restaurant advertising cat meatballs.

About 40 activists stormed into the Fangji cat meatball restaurant, in Shenzhen, just over the border from Hong Kong, and forced it to close.

Outside, they hung banners that said: "Cats and dogs are friends of humans. Stop eating them, please."

Attitudes to domestic animals have until recently been seen as one of the great East-West cultural divides. Dogs are a delicacy in Korea and China.

Cats are eaten less but are a speciality in parts of the south, as are rat, civet cat, spiny anteaters and others.

But animal rights organisations are growing more active as the number of people keeping pets rises.

The owner of the Fangji restaurant said he would stop serving cat. Apparently he had warning of the attack, as no live animals were found on the premises. But a skinned cat was found in the fridge, causing some protesters to burst into tears.