Why This Shelter Exists
Before and After
Before 2020
The shelter was a kill facility run by the city’s hygiene service.
Their job was catching strays – not caring for them. Dogs were crammed into pens with no food budget, no vet, no cleaning schedule. Disease spread unchecked. When the pens got full, healthy dogs were killed to make space. Nobody outside knew. Volunteers weren’t allowed in. The public never saw what happened behind the gates.
In Serbian law, animals are classified as property – not sentient beings. A shelter that kills healthy dogs was not breaking any law.
Today
Same building. No more killing. Dogs going home.
Vesna, Pravo na život, local supporters, and the shelter team pushed for daily care: feeding, cleaning, walking, vaccinations, health checks, and sterilisation.
The killing stopped in 2020. But the dogs are still there, still waiting for homes.
What It Took
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2020
Vesna Teodorović starts “Pravo na život” (Right to Life). Fights for and wins unrestricted access to the shelter – previously closed to outsiders.
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2020
The killing stops. Completely. Including dogs the old management had labelled “aggressive.” A new shelter director is installed.
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After 2020
The city repeals the ban on feeding stray dogs – a 2016 ordinance that made it illegal to give food to a hungry animal on the street. The two-dog limit per household is also scrapped.
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2023
On 18 December, Šabac bans New Year’s fireworks city-wide on a motion by “Pravo na život.” Roughly 5,000 pets die during the holidays in Serbia every year according to estimates.
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2024
Šabac allocates 3 million dinars for sterilisation – roughly 400 procedures. The only thing that actually reduces the stray population. Vesna speaks at the University of Belgrade’s Faculty of Law. She reports 4,000 unregistered breeders in Serbia – none of them paying taxes, none of them held accountable. The city installs dog shelters in public parks.
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2025
Partnership with Strays e.V. (Berlin) – a German charity that doesn’t just import dogs abroad, but invests in improving conditions where the animals actually are.
Vesna Teodorović
Vesna runs a clothing store with her husband in Šabac – and spends her free time at the shelter, feeding dogs, coordinating vet visits, organising adoption events, and visiting schools to talk to children about what it means to be responsible for an animal. She pays for a large part of the shelter work out of her own pocket.
She started “Pravo na život,” recruited volunteers, and went up against the city administration to stop the killing at the municipal shelter.
Vesna doesn’t just run a shelter – she fights the system that makes shelters necessary. At the University of Belgrade, she demanded that Serbian law recognise animals as sentient beings instead of property. She reported 4,000 unregistered breeders operating without oversight, without taxes, flooding the country with puppies that end up on the streets. She called for a national database of animal abusers and real prison sentences for cruelty – not the warnings and fines that are currently standard.
At home, Vesna has roughly 70 dogs and 10 cats on her own property – animals that had nowhere else to go. She didn’t buy a single one – they’re all rescues that had nowhere else to go.
The way a society treats its animals is a mirror of that society.
A hungry dog searches for food and follows people carrying bags. That’s not aggression – that’s hunger.
Strays e.V. – Not Another Rescue Organisation
Strays e.V. is a registered charity in Berlin. Unlike many rescue organisations, they don’t just fly dogs abroad – they fund sterilisation, medical care, and infrastructure where the animals actually are. Their goal: get these dogs out of the shelter and into homes.
Strays e.V. is run entirely by volunteers. Every donation goes to keeping the dogs healthy and ready for adoption. When a dog gets adopted, that’s the result.
Strays e.V. is recognised as a charitable organisation by the German tax authorities (Finanzamt Köln-Süd). All donations are tax-deductible in Germany.
Based in
Berlin, Germany
Registered charity (Finanzamt Köln-Süd)
Donate
Bank: IBAN DE70 4306 0967 1316 4725 00
BIC: GENODEM1GLS (GLS Bank)
PayPal: Teamwork@strays.de
These dogs are ready. Are you?
Vesna, Pravo na život, local supporters, the municipal shelter, and Strays e.V. helped stop the killing and keep the dogs visible. The one thing they cannot do is take them all home.
Šabac Shelter Dogs
Dogs at the shelter in Šabac, Serbia. All ready for a home. Supported by volunteers and Strays e.V., Berlin.
E-Mail: pravonazivotsabac@gmail.com
Phone: +381 63 8130993
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Strays e.V.
IBAN: DE70 4306 0967 1316 4725 00
BIC: GENODEM1GLS
PayPal: Teamwork@strays.de
Donation receipts available on request.
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