The young bear Đuro, who was left by an unknown person at the gate of the Animal Shelter in the village of Blizna at the end of July last year, has not been on that property near Podgorica for three months, and the owner Miljan Milickovic he says that he does not know where he is.
This stems from the report that Miličkovic submitted to the police in September and the inspection report from November, documentation that "Vijesti" had access to.
The Police Directorate, the Ministry of Agriculture and the Directorate for Food Safety, Veterinary and Phytosanitary Affairs did not respond to questions from the newsroom regarding the disappearance of the bear from the property in the village of Blizna in Priper. Milicković did not answer the questions either.
Arrival and disappearance
The bear arrived at Milicković's house, as he told it earlier, in July 2023, when he was left as a seven-month-old cub in a transporter by an unknown person at the gate of the property owned by Milicković.
The bear was then "temporarily" cared for at his place, and in a prize game he organized on social networks, the bear was named Đuro.
In the meantime, international animal protection organizations "Animal Survival International" (ASI) and "Four Paws" insisted that a permanent solution be found for the bear and that the animal be moved to a specialized shelter.
At the beginning of September, a year and two months after the brown bear cub was "temporarily" cared for with him, the owner of the property in the village of Blizna reported to the police that the animal was missing.
According to the documentation that "Vijesti" had access to, Miličković submitted the report to the Police Directorate, Security Department in Podgorica on September 12.
Among other things, he stated in the application that on September 9, around eight in the morning, he came to the property where the shelter is located, when he noticed "that a one-year-old bear was missing from its reserve, which was secured by an electric fence."
According to the report, he told the police officers that the bear had already left the area:
"Due to its size, this bear managed to get out of its reserve a couple of times, but each time we managed to find it quickly, since the animal is socialized. I could not notice any damage to the fence or anywhere in the reserve," he told the police officers.
In the application, he also stated that in the past period he had problems with the international organization "Animal Survival International", that he does not claim that their associates in Montenegro have anything to do with the disappearance of bears.
"But I honestly doubt it," he added.
Inspection supervision
In March of this year, the international organizations ASI and "Četiri Šape" appealed to the Departments of Ecology, Agriculture and Forestry with a request to help them relocate the Đuro bear from the shelter in the village of Blizna.
As they told "Vijesta", the government gave permission in June for Đuro, "which is the property of the state, to move from unsuitable conditions in Montenegro to the 4PAWS bear sanctuary in Bulgaria", but Milicković, they claim, refused to cooperate, " making it impossible to check the bear's health and condition".
"At the beginning of November, ASI reacted when volunteers went to visit the zoo where the Đuro bear was on two occasions, when they were informed that it was in quarantine, awaiting relocation to Bulgaria, and that it was therefore not possible to see it. Suspecting this, ASI contacted the relevant government institutions, requesting an urgent inspection," they told "Vijesta".
According to the documentation submitted to the newsroom from international organizations, the inspection supervision was initiated on November 18 by the veterinary, ecological and hunting inspection.
The veterinary inspector went to the field on November 28, when it was established that the bear Đuro was not in the shelter.
"The inspection control determined immediately after the arrival and the start of the inspection control that the bear cub is not in the fenced area within the zoo where it was in the earlier period (which the veterinary inspectors had an insight into during earlier official visits to this zoo)". it is written in the minutes that "Vijesti" had access to.
The international organization that initiated the surveillance criticizes the inspectors because, in the meantime, since the day Milicković reported to the police that the bear was missing, they have not controlled the shelter.
"Upon arrival, Milicković told them that Đuro disappeared in the night between September 8 and 9, he gave them a copy of the police report, which means that the bear disappeared three months before, during which the Veterinary Inspection did not carry out checks and did not notice that the bear there is none. From all this, it follows that from the beginning of September to November, Milicković did not even try to inform the authorities that the bear had disappeared, even though he had a legal obligation to do so," the international organization that initiated the surveillance told "Vijesta".
The Environmental Protection Agency unofficially confirmed to "Vijesti" that Milicković did not report the disappearance of the bear to them, even though he was obliged to.
According to the minutes after the inspection of the veterinary inspection, Milicković told the inspectors that he received instructions from the police officer not to inform anyone about the disappearance of the bear, "in order to carry out the investigation".
Institutions "scheduled"
Executive Director of ASI, Dejvid Berit, assessed that, in relation to the bear Đura, the competent institutions in Montenegro "handled the situation poorly".
"International organizations and government officials worked together for months on Đuro's documentation for resettlement, while the authorities had no idea that the bear had disappeared," he said, calling for a detailed police and government investigation.
"It is in the best interest of Montenegro. As an international charity working in many countries, we know that weak wildlife law enforcement and rampant illegal wildlife trade harm the country and its citizens. We just have to wait for the reaction of the authorities, first of all the prosecutor's office and the police, who have the task of discovering the circumstances under which bear Đuro disappeared and to hope that he is still alive and unharmed," said Berit.
International organizations and state officials worked together for months on Đuro's documentation for relocation, while the authorities had no idea that the bear had disappeared, said the International Organization for the Recovery of Animals, calling for a detailed investigation.
He reminded that in 2017 there were two bear cubs, Maša and Brundo, near Milicković.
"After the rescue operation, the bears were transferred to the Arcturos bear sanctuary in Greece. However, soon a new cub appeared in his zoo, which is still imprisoned there. That bear is known to the general public as the bear Ljubo. DNA testing could easily resolve whether Ljubo was related to the previously rescued bears, but despite bear experts, charities and concerned citizens asking for an investigation, nothing was done," said Berit.
At the end of 2022, 12 animals, six of which were wild, died in 14 hours on the property where the Milčković shelter and zoo is located.
They gave him a match without papers
The state never signed any contract with Milicković or gave him permission to keep the young bear Đura.
This is claimed by Milicković in the statement he gave to the veterinary inspector during the inspection.
"I have never received any type of contract (or approval) from the relevant state institutions that would regulate the rights and obligations of our zoo, as well as the rights and obligations of the owner of this cub (the state of Montenegro), in connection with the stay of this cub in our garden ", it is written in the minutes.
He also added that during the 13 months that the bear was with him, "no one from state institutions, also no NGO, has ever officially visited the cub during the cub's stay... in order to provide assistance with keeping it".
"No state institution and no NGO has ever brought or donated a single kilogram of food for this cub... not a single euro as aid for keeping and feeding", he stated, with accusations against "some NGOs" that, on the contrary, "with their malicious actions, they harmed the bear cub".
He is grateful for the support of the Directorate for Food Safety, Veterinary and Phytosanitary Affairs and Director Vladimir Đaković.
"The UBHVFP provided funds in the amount of 12.000 euros in 2022, which amounted to a third of the total funds invested in the infrastructure equipment and construction of the bear reserve in our zoo, with a total area of 8.000 square meters... We thank the UBHVFP for helped us create a quality reserve for the brown bear," Milicković told the inspectors.
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