Fur trade

An adult female bear was freed from an illegal trap thanks to the joint efforts of Greek and Albanian authorities and wildlife organizations.

Weighing approximately 90 kilograms, the five year old bear managed to survive deep in the woods for an entire week, caught in the grips of a steel wire noose, an illegal trap often used by poachers. 

Bears in the eastern province of Van raise eyebrows among scientists as they defy their natural hibernation patterns due to global warming and the availability of food all year round, warns professor Dr. Lokman Aslan, the director of the Van YYU Wildlife Conservation and Rehabilitation Center.

The brown bears in Nymfaio, near Florina, in northern Greece, have entered their winter hibernation following recent colder weather and snow, as announced by Arcturos on Friday.

At least 11 people have been detained in relation to the murder of a high-profile lawyer by armed assailants in Istanbul.

Şafak Mahmutyazıcıoğlu, a 42-year-old lawyer, was shot dead on Jan. 26 following a fight that broke out at a restaurant.

Turkey's last dancing bear died in an animal shelter in the country's northwestern province, marking the end of a cruel tradition that was made illegal years ago.

Brütüs, a 37-year-old grizzly who was the last surviving member of the 64 dancing bears brought to a shelter in Bursa's Karacabey district decades ago, died of multiple organ failure due to old age.

Some 70 camera traps, placed in the eastern province of Erzincan, have snapped images from the daily lives of wild animals living in their own habitat. (AA Photo)

Ljubljana – As many as 130 brown bears were culled in Slovenia this year until 11 August, of which 121 were hunted on the basis of the Environment Agency’s permits and nine were found dead, the Environment Ministry told the STA on Friday, four days after a brown bear attacked a local while he was jogging near the town of Pivka, SW.

Fines for feeding bears by individuals could be doubled or even tripled from the current level, which is somewhere between 3,000 and 5,000 RON, according to a the secretary of state of the Ministry of Environment, Waters and Forests (MMAP), Robert Szep. "We are working on a piece of legislation to limiting and drastically sanctioning the feeding of bears by unauthorized people near localities.

Two endangered Syrian brown bears were headed to a new life in the United States on July 18 after being rescued from cramped conditions in a Lebanese zoo, two charities said.

Homer and Ulysses, each aged 18 and weighing 130 kilos, had been living in a zoo near the southern city of Tyre, animal rights association Animals Lebanon said.

A brown bear has been spotted on streets of Mytishchi, Moscow's residential suburb with a population of about 170,000, a source in the city's emergency services told TASS on Tuesday.