| Submit your comments on this article |
| -Lurid Crime Tales- |
| Slovakia backs plan to shoot 350 bears after man killed in attack |
| 2025-04-04 |
| [BBC] The Slovak cabinet has approved a plan to shoot around a quarter of the country's brown bears, after a man was mauled to death while walking in a forest in Central Slovakia. Prime Minister Robert Fico's populist-nationalist government announced after a cabinet meeting that 350 out of an estimated population of 1,300 brown bears would be culled, citing the danger to humans after a spate of attacks. "We can't live in a country where people are afraid to go into the woods," the prime minister told reporters afterwards. "You ever seen Deliverance?" A special state of emergency allowing bears to be shot has now been widened to 55 of Slovakia's 79 districts, an area that now covers most of the country. The government in Bratislava has already loosened legal protections allowing bears to be killed if they stray too close to human habitation. Some 93 had been shot by the end of 2024. The plans to shoot even more were condemned by conservationists, who said the decision was in violation of international obligations and could be illegal. "It's absurd," said Michal Wiezik, an ecologist and MEP for opposition party Progressive Slovakia. "The Environment Ministry failed desperately to limit the number of bear attacks by the unprecedented culling of this protected species," he told the BBC. "To cover up their failure, the government has decided to cull even more bears," he continued. Wiezik argued that thousands of encounters a year passed without incident, and he hoped the European Commission would intervene. Slovak police confirmed on Wednesday that a man found dead in forest near the town of Detva in Central Slovakia on Sunday night was killed by a bear. His wounds were consistent with an attack. The 59-year-old man had been reported missing on Saturday after failing to return from a walk in the woods. Bears are common across the Carpathian mountain range, which stretches in an arc from Romania through western Ukraine and on to Slovakia and Poland. |
| Posted by:Skidmark |
| #6 It's a Bear market. |
| Posted by: Skidmark 2025-04-04 14:37 |
| #5 I suppose there's a bear conspiracy. Or to send a message to Russia. |
| Posted by: ed in texas 2025-04-04 13:11 |
| #4 I suppose this means the Latin Language Copy of the report to the EU was improperly conjugated which will lead to the suspension of Fico's political career and Wiezik to immediately be crowned Prime Minister. |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2025-04-04 10:21 |
| #3 "We can't live in a country where people are afraid to go into the woods," "Afraid" is a bit much, but you should at least be cautious. Nature will kill you soon as looking at you. Quicker if you're a dumbass. |
| Posted by: SteveS 2025-04-04 09:38 |
| #2 Bear bile has been a valuable and effective medicinal material in traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) for over 13 centuries. However, the current practice of obtaining it through bear farming is under scrutiny for its adverse impact on bear welfare. |
| Posted by: Skidmark 2025-04-04 08:31 |
| #1 After Another Fatal Attack in the Carpathian Mountains, Slovakia Set To Cull Hundreds of Bears Among Soaring ‘Overprotected’ Populations |
| Posted by: Skidmark 2025-04-04 01:44 |