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CNN
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Earlier this month, a team of 14 armed police officers armed with camera traps, thermal imaging drones and shoot-to-kill orders ran through the forest searching for the fugitive.
However, their target was not a serial killer. It was a brown bear that went on a rampage in a town in Slovakia 10 days ago, injuring five people.dramatic social media picture The animal was seen running through the streets of Liptovsky Mikulas as people fled for safety, prompting authorities to declare a state of emergency.
Town officials announced in a Facebook post Wednesday that they had cornered and killed the bear that carried out the attack. But some Slovak critics question whether they got the right bear.
Animal conservationists are excited as wild brown bear populations across Europe have rebounded from the brink of extinction. However, a spate of attacks on humans has led to calls for an end to the protections the species enjoys. Some countries argue that the law favors bears too much at the expense of human lives.
According to local media, the incident in Liptovsky Mikulas comes days after another bear encounter in Slovakia’s Lower Tatras, in which a 31-year-old Belarusian tourist fell to his death while trying to escape from the bear. Ta.
Several European Union countries that favor scaling back bear conservation efforts are now taking their fight to EU headquarters in Brussels.
On Monday, delegations from Romania, Slovakia and Finland submitted a proposal to the EU Environment Council calling for the protection status of some brown bear populations to be downgraded.
Current EU law prohibits killing wild bears, except in very limited circumstances, such as when a wild bear has killed or seriously injured a human. Violation of this law can result in heavy fines for the violating country.
How to deal with bear attacks has long been a political issue in some of the EU’s 27 member states. But with veto power in countries with more prominent conservation plans or with smaller bear populations, it will be some time before bears become fair game for hunters again. there is a possibility.
A bear looting a beehive
According to a recent information memo sent to all delegations to the EU Environmental Council, Romania, Slovakia and Finland have moved certain bear populations (those in “good conservation status”) from “strictly protected” to They are requesting that the status be downgraded to “protected.” Attack in Slovakia.
In both conservation categories, countries have the same obligation to maintain a “favorable” status, said John Linnell, a senior researcher at the Norwegian Institute for Nature Research who specializes in large carnivore conservation.
“What’s different is the circumstances in which it’s permissible to kill things,” he told CNN. “Under “protected,” killing an individual (animal) requires a very specific reason…If only “protected,” the same obligation to justify that reason does not exist. there is no.”
What “advantageous” means is also debatable.
Dominika Zarzycka/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images
Earlier this month, a 31-year-old Belarusian tourist died trying to escape from a bear in Slovakia’s Lower Tatra Mountains.
“It’s not a scientific concept,” Linnell said. “It’s not just numbers, it’s numbers, habitat, population trends and distribution.”
Delegations supporting the new proposal say the EU’s brown bear population has increased since the Habitat Directive was established in the region in 1992, and the rules need to be made more flexible. There is. The number of brown bears, which are critically endangered in many areas, is currently estimated to be between 15,000 and 16,000 living in the region.
Delegations supporting the downgrading of the brown bear’s status say it does not undermine the “overarching objective” of EU protection law and point to the impact the bears are having.
“The strengthening and expansion of the brown bear population is increasing the impact on rural communities and livestock farming,” the information note said, adding that in Romania alone, 240 bear attacks were reported between 2004 and 2021. he added. He also talks about interactions between farmers. And the bears caused economic losses of millions of euros.
But some argue there are more humane ways to prevent bear attacks. Robin Rigg, president of the Slovak Wildlife Association, told CNN that preventative measures such as electric fences can help keep bears away from attractants such as beehives, fruit trees and livestock.
He noted that if a particular bear is a recurring problem known as a “problem individual,” current law already allows that bear to be removed from the population without changing the species’ protection level. He said there was.
A recent study found that some animals are more troublesome than others, exhibiting what experts call “repetitive conflict behavior.”
Perhaps the most famous example of this phenomenon is in the mid-2000s, when a bear called Bruno, also known as Bear JJ1, pillaged beehives and attacked sheep in Germany after being reintroduced as part of conservation efforts. is what was discovered.
A bear cub breaks into a bakery
Several countries attending Monday’s EU Environment Council meeting expressed sympathy for the proposal. Italy said it supported the idea, and Hungary said it was ready to do so, but stressed the issue needed to be “carefully considered” first.
Spain said the safety of people should be a priority and spoke of the need for precautionary measures, while Germany said existing rules were working well.
Slovakia, on the other hand, appealed to the emotions of the delegation. “Every day, bears run around our town. In the morning, parents are afraid to send their children to school,” the representative said.
Even if there was support, pushing the proposal through the EU’s bureaucracy will not be easy.
Ultimately, Linnell said, “countries that have absolutely no bears, like Ireland, Malta and Cyprus, will effectively have a veto,” Linnell said, adding that even their own citizens will have no political control over the issue. There is no guarantee that the house will be agreed to, he added. In a country with bears.
The situation unfolded in real time last year when a bear originally scheduled to be killed for fatally mauling a 26-year-old woman in Italy was given a reprieve after the intervention of several wildlife organizations. It was done.
In another example, also in Italy, police launched an investigation after a man shot and killed a female bear that wandered onto his property. Her baby became an internet sensation by roaming the streets and even breaking into bakeries. He claimed he shot the bear out of fear but did not want to kill it.
Outside of Europe, not all countries are so generous. In Japan, authorities offered bear trappers the equivalent of $33 for each animal captured after last year’s record number of attacks.
Linnell said some countries are seriously struggling to achieve conservation success, adding that saving species from extinction is just the beginning.
“Enjoying that conservation success is a much more difficult problem,” he said. “Some species improve while others decline, so we have to react and adapt. That’s my real hope.”
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