>>>ANSA/Legal battle over bear culling order continues

(ANSA) - ROME, MAY 2 - The legal battle over the fate of a bear that attacked and killed a trail runner in the northern Alpine province of Trento in early April continued on Tuesday as a local court suspended a second order by the provincial government to have it put down.
    In its ruling, the local administrative tribunal (TAR) upheld an appeal lodged by animal rights groups on Friday after Provincial Governor Maurizio Fugatti issued a new edict for the 17-year-old female bear tagged as Jj4 to be culled.
    The same court had already suspended a first culling order issued by Fugatti shortly after Jj4 attacked and killed 26-year-old Andrea Papi while he was out running in woods near the town of Caldes in Trentino's Val di Sole on 5 April.
    He was the first person to be killed by a bear in Italy in modern times.
    The order to kill Jj4 and another bear also known to be dangerous has divided public opinion in Italy and prompted an outcry among animal rights groups, which have slammed the provincial government's "obsessive war on bears in Trentino".
    Meanwhile, Jj4 has been captured and is being kept in an enclosed area at the Casteller anima centre in Trento pending a final decision on her fate.
    Michela Vittoria Brambilla, president of the Italian League for the Defense of Animals and the Environment (Leidaa), one of the associations that appealed against the second culling order, on Tuesday hailed the decision by the court.
    "Jj4 is locked up at Casteller and therefore cannot harm anyone," said the lawmaker and former tourism minister, adding that she "truly hoped that the president and his government will now stop sowing fear and hatred toward the bears of Trentino".
    "This is not the way to handle the matter, she said.
    "The narrative of 'killer bears' does serious damage to tourism, which is important for the economy of the province of Trento," she concluded.
    Green Europe national co-spokesman and Green and Left Alliance lawmaker Angelo Bonelli likewise described the "policy of hatred towards bears" allegedly enacted by the Trento provincial government as "intolerable".
    The TAR ruling "confirms the sloppiness with which the President of the Province, Maurizio Fugatti, has handled the bear issue, behaving as if they were his property, having done nothing to prevent their concentration in the Val di Sol and to create ecological corridors to encourage their dispersal throughout the Eastern Alps, having forgotten to change the batteries in bear JJ4's radio collar," said Bonelli.
    Environment Minister Gilberto Pichetto Fratin Putting has also said that he hopes Jj4 can be transferred to a safe place rather than be put down and has requested the involvement of animal rights' associations in drawing up a plan to manage the bear population in Trentino. (ANSA).