Dozens of caged dogs were lined up on the tarmac in Denmark waiting to be flown to the UK and used in labs for medical research.
The desperate-looking beagles were among more than 1,000 to have been imported from the US via Copenhagen in the past two years.
They are jetted in despite the UK having one of the world’s biggest beagle-breeding facilities.
MBR Acres in Wyton, Cambs, is owned by US firm Marshall BioRescources and produces about 2,000 of them a year for experimental use.
But Freedom of information requests revealed in the two years to January, 1,092 dogs have been imported.
One of the Danish FOIs shows a consignment of beagles being sent to LabCorp in Huntingdon, which is just 15 minutes from MBR Acres.
Robert Cogswell, of the Beagle Freedom Project UK, who obtained the documents, said: “Not only are beagles forced to endure painful experiments inside UK labs, their misery begins at the point of birth.
“They are born into what can only be described as industrial-size puppy farms where they are merely objects for profit and no consideration is given to their welfare and bred in conditions that would be considered illegal if the dogs were being bred as domestic pets.”
He added: ”We currently have a situation where beagle dogs are being flown halfway around the world, landing at Copenhagen airport before being transferred to another plane and flown to [the UK].
“It begs the question of why dogs are being put through additional torment when a Marshall Bio facility already exists in the UK. Not only that but why are the dogs being forced to endure such long journeys? If the welfare of the animals was paramount, why not transport them directly into the UK?”
The documents also revealed that in April 2022, 96 dogs were imported into the UK from the now-discredited company Envigo, based in Cumberland, Virginia. It had its licence revoked in May 2022 after multiple breaches of animal welfare laws and 4,000 of their dogs were confiscated.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex adopted one of them, Mamma Mia.
Marshall BioResources did not respond to a request for comment.
Wendy Jarrett, CEO of Understanding Animal Research, an organisation which seeks to explain why animals are used in research and whose members include Marshall BioResources as well as leading drug firms and universities, said: “UK law requires that all potential new medicines are safety-tested in animals before they are given to human volunteers in clinical trials. This safety testing often involves the use of dogs, to check that the animals are not harmed by the new medicine.
“The UK has a specialist breeding facility that supplies the dogs that are used in this research, but around 3,000 dogs are required each year and there may be a very few occasions when a limited number of animals need to be imported from overseas to meet demand.
“The facility has also been the focus of sustained animal rights activism for the last 22 months, which may have affected its business, meaning that dogs have had to be flown in from abroad in order to allow the required regulatory safety testing to go ahead before clinical trials of new medicines.”
