Rehabilitation centre for bear's cubs set up in Primorye

A special rehabilitation centre for bear-cubs orphaned by poaching has been set up in Primorye. Sergei Bereznyuk, the President of the Bio Varieties Preservation Fund, the Far East, told RIA Novosti. At present there are 10 bear-cubs at the Ussuriisk rehabilitation centre. Experts of the centre are running a special rehabilitation course to adjust the bear-cubs for the natural environment following the unique method of Professor V. Pazhetnov. The adoption of 10 orphaned cubs over 1 month only makes Primorye environmentalists worry, since, as a rule, the official statistics mentions no more than 10 percent of the total number of reported poaching cases. According to Bereznyuk, bear's cubs get born in late January or in early February that's why the charges of the rehabilitation centre have evidently lost their mothers after the end of the official bear hunting season on January 15th, 2002. The huge demand for bear's bile and paws used in oriental medicine in neighbouring China is the main reason for the illegal hunting.