Photos by Ina Fassbender. REUTERS
I've always tried to make this blog about positive things, but Brent Stirton's pictures of the slain gorillas were so powerfully and sensitively done (as well as conveying the respect for life and courage of the villagers carrying the bier) that I felt no qualms about posting them. However, as something of an antidote to the cruelty pictured yesterday, here are some much more cuddly and life-affirming animal pictures of the siberian tiger Shakyra and one of her five two-day old cubs at their enclosure at the Hamm Zoo in Germany. The birth of five tiger babies last Wednesday was completely unexpected, as the zoo had not even known that Shakyra was pregnant! But clearly mother and child are doing well, and the circle of life goes on.
