#sick lion

World’s loneliest lion left starving and covered in blood

http://metro.co.uk/video/lion-roars-help-yemen-zoo-1303101/?ito=vjs-link

Covered in scratches and nothing but skin and bone, this once noble lion is trapped and lonely in the middle of a warzone.

Stuck behind bars, the lion at Taiz Zoo in war-torn Yemen roars pathetically from inside his cage. But in the middle of air raids and tank shells one man and a small group of volunteers cross the front line every day to go and care for the animals of the zoo.Bassam Al-Hakimi, 25, once owned an internet café that has been destroyed and he was an industrial engineering student before the conflict.But now he is helping Chantal Jonkergouw and Victoria Johner y Cruz from the SOS Zoo and Bear Rescue Group – bring funds from donors around the world to try and stop the zoos 266 animals from starving to death.

It takes around 3,300 US dollars (around £2,200) to feed and medically treat just the lions and endangered Arabian leopards in the zoo – which also houses monkeys, deer, horses, birds and reptiles. Before donations started being raised 12 lions and six leopards had already died from starvation. Since February they have raised nearly 70,000 US dollars (£50,000) and Bassam, who works Tamdeen Youth Foundation in Yemen, incredibly crosses the FRONT LINE every day to help the animals.

He said: ‘The zoo is about five kilometres (three miles) from the front line. About two months ago, the Saudi Air Force bombed an Al-Huthi forces tank stationed near the zoo causing an explosion and flying debris which damaged the snake cage.

‘A lot of my friends have been killed in the war, in the zoo there is no danger, but we have to cross the front line and are right in the middle of the two fighting forces. A friend of mine was killed walking next to me.

‘Animals are living beings just like us, they have the right to live in freedom, I help these animals because I’m a human and I cannot see these animals suffer and die of hunger without doing anything, This is our duty as human beings.’

Bassam, who said he was involved in protests against what he saw as a corrupt government before the war started, said he does get some joy from the zoo. He said: ‘There is a little horse which I love, she is lonely but she runs up to me cheerful and energetic every time I see her. She still loves life.

‘Of course many of the animals are very sad, when I stand in front of the cage, and hear the sad roar of the lion, and I see his desperate looks, this breaks my heart.

‘Certainly Yemenis have had this war imposed on us and we are paying the price for it, and the animals are most affected because they cannot do something and are just waiting to die in cages.

‘The world must push for peace, and pressure on all the conflicting parties in Yemen to stop this senseless war. ‘We must protect these innocent animals from the dangers of hideous wars that we do as humans, I hope that we can provide a nature reserve where these animals live freely and peacefully one day.’

Chantal Jonkergouw, a Dutch banking executive living in Sweden, and Victoria Johner y Cruz, a lawyer based in Geneva, have helped campaign to save the amimals in Taiz. Both are just animal lovers wanting to make a difference who have used their skills to find reliable contacts in Yemen and donors around the world to try and save the zoo. But so far the war has proved something too difficult to get past in terms of an original aim of getting the animals out of the country to safety.

Chantal said: ‘The absolute minimum is about 3,300 US dollars a week, so about 471 US dollars a day.

‘We had difficulties with the hygiene at the zoo, so we had to make it really clean and used the money to help because this was causing bacterial infections in the lions.

‘By our own count we have about 266 animals at the zoo including 19 lions and 26 leopards.

‘When the war hit and siege specifically of the town, then there were no visitors and the zoo was closed down, no one was paid so the staff left.

‘So the treatment of the animals got worse because of all these things. The people were suffering in the war and the animals tend to be low on the list of priorities obviously.

‘Bassam has become our project manager and he had no connection to the zoo before but they went there to help the animals.

‘We have seen video taken of the dump used by the zoo which was full of dead bodies of animals from there, leopard bodies, lion bodies, before we started working with them.

‘There could have been a lot of things playing how these animals died, they could have been sick and dying but there could have been interest in their fur and pelts too.

‘It’s life and death essentially, if we and the Tamdeen workers on the ground had not of stepped in the animals would have starved to death essentially.

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