OSLO: A polar bear was shot dead after attacking a German cruise ship worker on Norway’s Svalbard archipelago in the Arctic Ocean, the authorities said on Sunday.

The unnamed man in his 40’s suffered head injuries shortly after landing on Spitzbergen island. He was accompanying a tourist expedition from the MS Bremen of Hapag-Lloyd Cruises on Saturday.

“The bear was killed by another employee on the boat,” said police commissioner Ole Jakob Malmo. Hapag-Lloyd Cruises said it was “self-defence”. “We greatly regret this incident,” said company spokesman Moritz Krause.

The company said excursions of this nature required staff to check areas before landing and to protect those onboard against polar bear attacks.

Polar bears have been protected in Norway since 1973 and nearly 1,000 were counted on Svalbard during a 2015 census. The archipelago, roughly twice the size of Belgium, lies about 1,000 kms from the North Pole.

Five fatal polar bear attacks have been recorded on Svalbard in the last 40 years.

Published in Dawn, July 30th, 2018