Spain votes on future of ‘sadistic’ bull festival

Spanish animal rights group PACMA managed to gather 85,000 signatures before presenting the petition at the Spanish Parliament's lower house.

PACMA's appeal favours a ban on a bull-spearing festival held in the town of Tordesillas in northern Spain every September.

"Tradition cannot be used as an excuse to torture these animals," United Left environmental spokesperson Laia Ortiz told Spanish daily 20minutos.

"It's one of the biggest acts of brutality in Spain. A slow torture for sadistic pleasure."

The medieval Toro de la Vega festival sees hundreds of spear-wielding participants taking on a 600-kilo ( 1322lb) beast through the streets and fields of Tordesillas.

Ten to fifteen thousand people took to the streets of Madrid on the lead up to the festivity to call for an end to the bloodshed.

Twenty bulls were even "liberated" on the eve of the carnage, but Toro de la Vega still went ahead.