A rally against the Kremlin's plans to legalize the killing of polar bears will be held in Moscow on Saturday.
Legislation allowing the indigenous peoples in Russia's Far Eastern region of Chukotka to kill polar bears may be pushed through parliament next year.
In June, a Russian-U.S. commission set the annual quota of 58 animals for the natives of Chukotka and Alaska. Russia had earlier banned polar bear hunting.
"Right now, the legalization of the killing of polar bears in our country is completely untimely and unjustified," Varvara Semyonova, coordinator of the movement to protect the animal, told RIA Novosti.
The worldwide polar bear population may decrease by 30-50% in the next 50 years, scientists say. There are around 21,000 of them in the world today, according to estimates.
There are no exact figures for the current number of polar bears in the Far East. In the early 1990s, the figure hovered around 5,000.
MOSCOW, December 3 (RIA Novosti)
