High profile members of Russia's artistic community joined animal rights activists at the end of last month to protest against the Moscow city government's plans to round up stray dogs and deport them beyond the capital's boundaries. But while local authorities have to do something to reduce the number of strays roaming the streets, would this draconian scheme even work? ...

"They have decided to build a large hangar in the Yaroslavl Region for 30,000 to 60,000 dogs. I understand that some of those dogs will just come back here. There will be no control over them,” said actor Yevgeny Mironov. The actor is a member of the civil council set up by Moscow authorities at the beginning of this year to deal with regulating the number of stray dogs in Moscow. But Mironov, along with his fellow actors Leonid Yarmolnik, Konstantin Khabensky and animal welfare experts, is concerned about the city government's plans, not least because the scheme is no guarantee that there will be less strays on the streets of Moscow in the long term. ...