Zoo animals shiver without gas
2009-01-08 18:40
Anna Mudeva
Sofia - About 1 300 animals in a Bulgarian
zoo were left without gas to heat their enclosures on Thursday,
the latest victims of the Russia-Ukraine gas supply row.
The zoo in the capital Sofia rushed to switch to electric
heaters to keep its elephants, monkeys, parrots, rhinos and
hippos warm in the sub-zero temperatures.
"About a third of the animals are vulnerable to cold," said
the zoo's director Ivan Ivanov said.
"Only the Siberian tigers
feel comfortable in these temperatures."
All Russian gas supplies to Europe were halted over a price
dispute a day earlier.
Heating was sharply reduced in snow-covered Sofia and
hundreds of thousands of people across the Balkans were left in
the cold as the impact on the hardest-hit region grew.
Bulgaria and the western Balkans rely almost entirely on
Russian gas supplies which are crucial in the winter because
utilities use gas to heat homes, offices and factories.
- Reuters