Liao Yumin tried his best to reduce the number of deserted pets and rescue them. The white-haired man took the responsibility as the salvation director at the ASAP in 2004 after he retired from the product designer post in a factory. On a wall in his office, a small and gloomy rent apartment, he pastes a monthly report of a program in which 46 pet hospitals have offered free sterilization surgeries on more than 4,000 homeless cats.

"Desexing is the best way to reduce cat population. Cats are a proliferous species, and a grimalkin could probably breed three times a year, four kittens a time," Liao said, with his sweater sprinkled with cat hair.

Liao said his emotions vary every day as an animal protectionist: sympathy when seeing a cat wandering with filthy hair, relief when he brings a cat to the salvage centre, and anger when seeing a pet is abused.

A fundraising box in the Beijing Association of Small Animal Protection office. (Chinadaily.com.cn)

Since 2006 when an online video footage showed a young woman stampeded a cat to death, news of animal abuses or even inhumanely killing have hit the headlines repeatedly. Recently, news reports said cats were ensnared in Fuzhou and sold to restaurants in Guangdong Province where people traditionally have a good appetite for all sorts of animals.

In Beijing, maimed cats and dogs are not rare to see. In the sunshine they sneak lamely across the pathway into a thin bush, with all kinds of physical injuries.

"Once a boy brought an injured cat to my office, it was horrible," Liao said. "Its pelvis was comminuted in bash. But when I touched its head, it still whipped the tail to me. They trust us, rely on people, but they might not get reciprocal treatment from people."

Fortunately, that small creature recovered at last.

In China, however, there is no law yet to punish evildoings towards animals. What Liao could do is to organize lectures and cat exhibitions at schools, colleges and department stores to raise people's affection towards this gentle and graceful creature.

His association, as a non-governmental organization, still has to wrestle for full social and legitimate recognitions. Every of the eight staff workers of the association is paid a bit more than 1,000 yuan monthly. "They come here just in hopes to do something to help the adorable animals," says Liao, who himself gets very little pay.

He says he hopes one day the animals can indeed live in cities without hurt or harm, and that the wish will come true only if new laws are made. Like South Korea is pushed towards banning eating dog meat, Liao says he believes "China will prohibit killing and abusing small animals, though it needs time."

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