Animals

Knut is dead! Thursday midday.

by Kris   ⋅   April 19, 2007   ⋅   Comment now   ⋅    RSS

“Knut is dead! Thursday midday.” That’s what an anonymous handwritten fax threatened today at the Berlin Zoo. What made it even worse is that the target is completely oblivious to any danger; he just kept rolling around in the dirt in his cage and chewed on his friend’s fingers. Knut is a polar bear cub.

It was bad enough to be rejected by his birth mother in December, even though vets insist polar bears are loners anyway, but to have someone try to off you when you’re barely four-and-a-half months old is just sad. Especially when this follows an uproar German media provoked when they misquoted an animal rights activist’s laments over the abandoned cub as grounds for euthanasia. Because of this misprint, Knut became an insta-celebrity. There was even a “Knut Day”. German Environment Minister Sigmar Gabriel even adopted the little bugger to promote the dangers of global climate change.

Boosted security (15 bodyguards!) prevented any harm to the fuzzy cutie today and police suspect the death threat was false anyway. Yay, Knut lives to nibble on fingers for another day.