The bear described as the world's "loneliest" has died a few months after being rescued. It had been kept captive for 12 years to be shown in a Ukrainian circus. The Daily Mail reported her death, citing the authorities.
The bear, named Jambolina, had lived caged for a Ukrainian circus since she was a few weeks old. She was rescued in December last year and taken to a protected area in the Swiss Alps.
The 12-year-old European bear's behaviour began to change around May. She had been taken elsewhere for routine surgery.
Died suddenly after an injection
A spokesperson for the animal charity Four Paws said on social media that it was a tragic and deeply painful event: "We are sorry to tell you that Jambolina has died suddenly."
Her breathing stopped soon after she was given an injection and she died. The exact cause has not yet been confirmed, and the charity said it was investigating.
A decade in a cage
She was born in 2009 at a zoo in Crimea, where she was put on show. A few weeks later she was separated from her parents and sold to be exhibited in a circus. There she was kept in a small cage and trained to perform in front of audiences, which animal conservationists describe as a form of abuse.
For more than a decade she was kept in a cage. She never came into contact with another bear and was never allowed into a natural environment.
When the coronavirus pandemic began, the circus closed. With his income gone, Jambolina's owner could no longer feed or care for her. The Four Paws charity then rescued her and on 8 December she was taken to Switzerland. The journey of more than 1,500 miles to the Alps, where a new home had been prepared for her, took four days. She was adapting quickly to her new surroundings.
In May she was introduced to a male companion for the first time, a bear named Meimo, who had been there since 2019. Staff were delighted to see her new zest for life. But two months later Jambolina was gone. Perhaps being known as the "loneliest" bear was the mystery of her life, and so it remained.
Source: Jagonews24. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.
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