Deepak Chopra condemns bear hunt
By Jack Keating, The ProvinceApril 16, 2009 8:16 AMComments (7)
A world-renowned author and public speaker strongly condemned B.C.'s trophy bear hunt as "cruel," "senseless" and "vulgar" yesterday.
Dr. Deepak Chopra spoke out against the practice of killing B.C.'s threatened grizzly bears in the province's Great Bear Rainforest as a "senseless sport" in a video on the conservation group Pacific Wild's website.
"To have a trophy in your house that shows the dead body of a grizzly bear . . . how obscene can that be in our modern age?" said Chopra, who has written more than 50 books in over 35 languages and appears regularly on CNN and other mainstream TV networks.
Chopra's criticism of the hunt of grizzly and black bears on the province's central coast is part of a growing B.C. and international campaign to end bear hunting.
"He has a huge following internationally," said Ian McAllister, conservation director with Pacific Wild.
"So the impact that his [criticism] will have in terms of international condemnation of British Columbia for continuing the bear hunt will be quite significant."
In 2007 there was a record 430 grizzlies killed in B.C., said McAllister. About 320 grizzlies were killed last year in B.C., he said.
On Feb. 23, Chopra and Kali Brauckmann, a 12-year-old Grade 7 student at Crescent Park Elementary in Surrey, co-wrote a letter to Premier Gordon Campbell urging him to "ban the trophy hunt of B.C.'s grizzly bears now."
The trophy bear hunt is held in the Great Bear Rainforest from April 1 to June 30.
Environment Minister Barry Penner said there are no plans to end the grizzly bear hunt.
Last month aboriginal and environmental groups formed a coalition to call for the provincial government to ban trophy hunting of bears in the Great Bear Rainforest.
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