Hunters are now allowed to kill more bears that are identified as "dangerous" to local residents, but critics say it's more about allowing hunters to go after them as trophy.
ADVERTISEMENTFrom January to mid-July, Slovakian authorities and hunters alike killed more than three dozen bears, leading to uproar among ecologists and activists.
The authorities shot 30 so-called "problematic" bears, and hunters were allowed to hunt down another 11, Milan Boroš, the general director of Slovakia's State Nature Conservancy office, has announced.
Last year, a series of attacks, some of them deadly, led to calls to reassess the protected status of bears in Slovakia and more widely across Central and Eastern Europe.
Now, Slovakia’s far-right environment minister, Tomáš Taraba, wants to ensure people are offered more protection so hunters will be given more opportunities to kill bears that are deemed to be dangerous.
But ecologists, as well as the opposition Progressive Slovakia party, vehemently disagree. One MEP, Michal Wiezik, who has repeatedly spoken out in defence of the bear population, said that the environment ministry has only found a way to legalise trophy bear hunting for hunters.
"We don't see any new competences, we don't see any strengthening of preventative measures," Wiezik said.
"The question really arises whether it was really about protecting and ensuring peace and quiet for the residents or whether the real motive was really to meet the hunters."
The European brown bear is currently protected under the EU Habitats Directive and the Bern Convention.
However, Brussels has given Slovakia provisional backing to amend its laws back in June, allowing it to hunt down bears when spotted near populated areas, according to a note seen by Euronews.
How dangerous are Slovakia's bears?
Videos posted by different users on X claim to show how bears and people can encounter each other, putting lives at great risk.
One video by X user Maciej Perzyna shows the town of Liptovský Mikuláš, near the Tatra mountains, where five people aged between 10 and 72 were injured earlier this year.
Encounters do not necessarily result in attacks, however. Data from the Slovak Nature Conservancy shows that bear attacks have gone up since 2000 but by only a handful, from one attack in 2001 to a total of 12 attacks in 2023.
According to renowned ecologist Erik Baláž, preventive measures are more effective and desirable than culling bears. He blames the ministry for not doing enough to prevent hungry bears endangering people, such as introducing bear-proof rubbish bins.
“The best way to avoid problems with bears is to use preventive measures, such as ensuring that they are not attracted to human settlements or protecting sheep with specially trained dogs, as in the past,” according to the World Wildlife Fund set of recommendations.
The European brown bear was almost hunted to extinction in Slovakia in the 1930s when as few as 20–60 of them remained.