■RUSSIA
Leopard faces eviction
A pet leopard named Cleopatra has become the latest victim of a bitter housing dispute in Moscow where residents are fighting to save their riverside houses from demolition. The leopard, which lives in a cage at a housing development, faces eviction and confiscation as its owner’s house is due to be demolished by city authorities. The natural resources ministry said on Friday that the leopard should be removed from its owner and given to a zoo or rehabilitation center. If the leopard proves to be a Far Eastern leopard, an endangered species native to Russia, it will be taken to a special center in the southern Russian city of Sochi, the ministry said. The owner of the leopard, businessman Sergei Bobyshev, said he has little hope of holding on to his pet. “If they take away my Cleopatra, she will die. Once I left her for a week with my friends. All that time she didn’t eat anything and waited for my return,” he said.
■POLAND
Church fingerprints kids
A Polish priest has installed an electronic reader in his church for schoolchildren to leave their fingerprints in order to monitor their attendance at mass, the Gazeta Wyborcza daily said on Friday. The pupils will mark their fingerprints every time they go to church over three years and if they attend 200 masses they will be freed from the obligation of having to pass an exam prior to their confirmation, the paper said. The pupils in the southern town of Gryfow Slaski told the daily they liked the idea and also the priest, Grzegorz Sowa, who invented it. “This is comfortable. We don’t have to stand in a line to get the priest’s signature [confirming our presence at the mass] in our confirmation notebooks,” said one pupil, who gave her name as Karolina.
■UNITED STATES
Zoo probes zebras’ death
Officials at Utah’s Hogle Zoo say they’ve launched an investigation into the deaths of two Grevy’s zebras. Officials said on Thursday that zookeepers found the first animal, Taji, dead in his exhibit area on Tuesday. A necropsy conducted that day identified no obvious cause of death. Staff found the second zebra, Monty, in distress and began treatment on Wednesday. He was later euthanized. Associate Director of Animal Health Nancy Carpenter said staffers were consulting with other veterinary experts to determine what caused the deaths. The US Department of Agriculture has been invited to participate in the investigation. Taji and Monty came to Utah in 1998. Grevy’s zebras are native to Africa and are considered endangered.
■UNITED STATES
Chicken on subway probed
A video posted online that shows a man kissing and snuggling a live chicken aboard the New York City subway has viewers giggling and the city transit agency launching an investigation. The subway rider who took the video said on Thursday that it was one of those New York moments she felt compelled to record. Kylie Kaiser, a 27-year-old architect, and two friends boarded a Manhattan train at around 7pm on Tuesday when they saw the man. “He was on his back, rolling from side to side, kissing, hugging and lifting the chicken up in the air,” she said. She said the man was oblivious to everything around him and didn’t respond to onlookers. NYC Transit spokesman Charles Seaton said no passengers reported the incident. He said only service animals, such as guide dogs, and animals in carriers are permitted in the subway.
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