BEIJING
A Siberian tiger released by Russian President Vladimir Putin has been spotted near the border with China, local media reported Friday.
Russia issued a message Thursday morning to a multinational NGO informing that Ilona, the tiger who is tagged with a tracking device, was detected moving toward China three days ago, Rivers without Boundaries Coalition coordinator Eugene Simonov told state news agency Xinhua.
He added Ilona was seen in an area less than five kilometers (just over three miles) from the Heilongjiang River that forms the border between the two countries.
Ilona is the second of the three Siberian tigers freed by Putin in May to venture into China after Kuzya, who is thought to have crossed the border earlier in October.
Simonov told Xinhua that Ilona might wander into an area with less food and more people upon crossing the border, whereas Kuzya was observed at the Taipinggou nature reserve in China's northeastern Heilongjiang Province.
The nature reserve’s director, Chen Zhigang, said Thursday that personnel were removing any traps in the area and setting up over 60 cameras to capturing an image of Ilona.
Simonov urged parties in the region to have a plan to respond as quickly as possible in case the tiger is trapped.
Putin has caught international attention with his diverse interactions with a variety of animals – domestic and exotic.
In 2012, he led a flock of endangered Siberian cranes on a microlite from a bird sanctuary in Yamal ahead of their winter migration to Central Asia.
In 2013, he shook hands with a walrus at the under-construction Primorsky Aquarium during a tour of Russia’s far east. Later that year, RIA Novosti news agency published a series of photos showing the president in white-and-red sportswear, matching that of Olympic athletes, rolling in the snow near Moscow with his two dogs, an Akita Inu and a Karakachan.
Ahead of the 2014 Sochi Olympics, he led top officials to a sanctuary where he patted a leopard as it sat on his lap.
Tiger parts have been used in traditional Chinese medicine because of the animal’s strength and mythical power.
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