WARSAW, March 4 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Six lions and six tigers from a shelter for abused animals near Kiev arrived in Poland on Thursday morning, a spokeswoman for Poznan Zoo which organised the evacuation said.
The Ukrainian truck, which covered nearly 1,000km from Kyiv to bypass the central region of Zhytomir which has been shelled by Russian forces, was also carrying two caracals and an African wild dog, Malgorzata Chodyla said.
The truck, which left on Tuesday, had to stop and stay parked all night when it came face to face with Russian tanks, she added.
At the border, the animals were transferred to a Polish lorry.
The undocumented animals were brought across the border legally thanks to a recent change in the international Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) procedure and with the help of Poland’s chief veterinary officer, Chodyla added.
Poznan Zoo director Ewa Zgrabczynska, who worked on the evacuation, is in contact with several Western organisations keen to take in the animals.
She has also launched a fundraising campaign.
Despite the war, Natalia Popova returned to the Ukrainian shelter to care for 70 other animals, according to Chodyla.
Two years ago, Zgrabczynska organised the rescue of nine tigers close to death after they were stranded in an Italian truck at the Polish-Belarusian border on their way to a zoo in Russia. — NNN-AGENCIES
