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King 'shot drunken bear'
19/10/2006 13:37 - (SA)
Moscow - Spain's King Juan Carlos I shot dead a tame bear during a private hunting trip to Russia earlier this year after the animal was plied with vodka to become an "easy target" for the monarch, the daily Kommersant reported on Thursday.
This type of practice risks turning hunting into a "clown show", a local official wrote in a complaint quoted by Kommersant to the governor of Vologda region in northwest Russia where the king travelled in August.
The "kind-hearted and fun bear named Mitrofan" was taken from his usual home in the Novlensky holiday camp in the region's forests, put in a cage and transported to nearby hunting grounds, the paper said.
It is common at vacation resorts in Russia to find exotic animals who have been domesticated and are fed, lodged and kept on hand for the entertainment of visitors.
The bear was taken to an area near the town of Vologda, 500 kilometres north of Moscow, fed vodka mixed with honey and then released into the fields, Kommersant said, citing the letter by the local hunting official.
The governor's office, contacted by AFP, could not comment on the report.
"Obviously, the sadly drunken animal was an easy target. His Highness Juan Carlos brought Mitrofan down with one shot," Sergei Starostin, deputy head of the Vologda regional department for defence and development of hunting resources, wrote in his complaint to the governor.
Starostin explained that the Spanish king was not the first VIP guest in the area for whom such a "spectacle" had been organised, and in his letter he named two local officials whom he said were directly responsible for planning such "hunting" expeditions, Kommersant said.
- AFP
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