Romania to step up cull of brown bears after hiker killed

Romania’s parliament has approved the culling of almost 500 bears this year in an effort to control the “overpopulation” of the protected species after a deadly attack on a hiker sparked nationwide outcry.

The country is home to 8,000 brown bears, according to the environment ministry, Europe’s largest brown bear population outside Russia.

Bears have killed 26 people and severely injured 274 others over the past 20 years in Romania, the ministry said this year.

After a young hiker was mauled to death on a popular trail in Romania’s Carpathian mountains last week, the prime minister, Marcel Ciolacu, summoned lawmakers back from their summer recess to attend an emergency session of parliament.

As well as adopting legislation on Monday to control the brown bear population, the parliament held a moment of silence in the 19-year-old hiker’s memory.

The new law authorises the culling of 481 bears in 2024, more than twice last year’s total of 220. Lawmakers argued that the bears’ overpopulation had led to an increase in attacks, while admitting that the law would not prevent attacks in the future.

Environmental groups denounced the measure. “The law solves absolutely nothing,” said Calin Ardelean, a World Wildlife Fund biologist, arguing that the focus should be shifted towards “prevention and intervention” as well as “problem bears”.

According to WWF Romania, culls will not remedy the problem unless measures are put in place to keep bears away from communities, such as better waste management or preventing people from feeding animals.

In 2023 about 7,500 emergency calls to signal bear sightings were recorded, more than double the number of the previous year, according to data presented last week by Romanian authorities.

This article by Agence France-Presse in Bucharest was first published by The Guardian on 15 July 2024. Lead Image: A bear on a road in Covasna, Romania, in September 2023. The country is home to about 8,000 brown bears. Photograph: Andrei Pungovschi/AFP/Getty Images.

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