After a long and lively debate French MPs have amended to the civil code to upgrade the status of animals from furniture to creatures with feelings. But they rejected proposals to ban bull and cockfighting, reports RFI.
The MPs passed an amendment by the ruling Socialist Party to the civil code to recognise animals as "living beings endowed with sensibilities".
Two other branches of French law - the penal code and the rural code - "already implicitly or explicitly recognised animals as living beings with feelings", according to the amendment's supporters.
But the civil code, which dates back to the reign of Napoleon Bonaparte, included them in the category of "personal property", on the same level as tables, chairs or toilet bowls.
Although most MPs considered the vote, which came as part of a package aimed at mondernising the law on a number of issues, a formality, some argued that it could protect pets from mistreatment, either by their owners or by third parties.
Read more of this report from RFI.