Polar killing fields

What do you think of when you think of polar bears? Fuzzy white fur? Cute little faces? Adorability come to life? How about: death, death and more death.

Russia on Thursday approved quotas allowing indigenous tribes in Chukotka, one of its most remote Arctic regions, to hunt endangered polar bears for the first time since 1957. The quota allows for 29 polar bears, including 19 females, to be killed per year.

Chukotka’s governor – who succeeded oligarch Roman Abramovich as head of the region a couple years ago – signed the decree.

Apparently, the quotas are part of a rule established by a US-Russian commission that allows indigenous people in Chukotka and Alaska to kill 58 polar bears per year.

Sad.