Romania's bears a headache for the authorities

0 Comments | AFP, August, 2008

BUCHAREST (AFP) — Authorities in Romania, one of the last countries in Europe with a large bear population, have grown worried about the animals' increasing forays into town, after several people were killed in recent years.

In the latest case, a 20-year-old man was ripped to shreds last week by a bear searching for food, as he was sleeping on a bench in an alleyway near downtown Brasov, in central Romania.

Local hunters, authorised by the environment ministry to track down the animal to prevent further attacks, found the female the next day, not far from the place where she had attacked her victim, and shot her dead as she tried to rush at them.

"Brown bears usually don't attack people. On the contrary, they'll run away if they see one," Dorel Noaghea, the...