Endangered bear guards mansion

BOGOR, West Java (JP): A man who claims to be a former guard of the late Gen. Soedirman, who created the Army, keeps an endangered sun bear to guard his mansion.

R.M. Suwarno Purwosaputro, 72, said Saturday he had official clearance to keep the Helarctos malayanus bear which he obtained from a zoo two years ago.

"We have it to guard our house because it has sharp instincts. It will shriek any time it sees a suspicious stranger," he said.

The bear occupies a two-meter-long, 1.5-meter-wide and 1.5- meter-high cage at the front gate of the mansion's grounds where it is exposed to pollution from heavy traffic on Jl. Pajajaran, Bogor.

Surwono's son-in-law, Lukman said the bear was fed properly and given a regular health check.

The animal was served papaya, bread, milk and honey at fixed times every day, he said. It will refuse food offered by a stranger.

Soewarno is known locally as a breeder of endangered Sumatran tigers and, at one time, jaguars. On his 0.5 hectare property in Ceger, on the northern outskirts of Bogor, he has two female Sumatran tigers, four horses and several birds.

The bear used to be kept on the property but was taken to the mansion's grounds after it became ill. Suwarno said he would return the bear to the property as soon as he got a male one to breed with it.

He said he had got a permit to breed the animals from the directorate general of nature conservation in 1991.

Sarwono claimed he obtained the tigers from a zoo but declined to say if he had paid for them.

"I once imported a jaguar and successfully bred it. I was then a supplier of jaguars to several zoos," he said. (24/pan)