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CNN Sunday Morning

Kuwaitis Help Animals in Trouble at Baghdad's Zoo

Aired April 27, 2003 - 10:40   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


KELLI ARENA, CNN ANCHOR: Kuwaitis are reaching out to help bring relief to animals in trouble at Baghdad's main zoo. Feed and hay were loaded onto trucks to head to the Al Zara (ph) facility. When the Iraqi regime came tumbling down, the animals were left to suffer. CNN's Michael Holmes went to the zoo, his reporting and that of others helped bring about relief efforts.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Major Rick Nussio takes a soldier's precautions as he prepares to enter the building. Safety off, taking his time, peering in before he enters the lion's den because that is what this is.

MAJ. RICK NUSSIO, TASK FORCE COMMANDER: Yes, here's a big male. Yes, all of the cages are secure.

HOLMES: Welcome to Baghdad's zoo and some of its forlorned, listless residents. Six lions here who had their last meal two days ago courtesy of the U.S. Army. They will eat again later this day. This massive park in central Baghdad contains the city zoo. A few days ago, however, it was a battlefield, inside the red zone. Iraqi soldiers had set up artillery, antiaircraft guns. The animals deserted, ignored, no doubt, terrified. When the Army came through, the soldiers couldn't believe what they found.

NUSSIO: I figured it was somewhat surreal. I mean, you know, here we are, we're in the middle of the city and everybody's talked about urban combat for two or three months and next thing you know there's camels walking through our positions and monkeys in the tree and at night you have a lion roaming free. It was very surreal, very strange.

HOLMES: Not just lions and camels, but two bears listless and hungry, an ocelot and more.

(on camera): What was the level of concern for these animals among the soldiers?

NUSSIO: Well, I think it was just their state of helplessness. I mean here they are caged up. They have no water. They have no food nor do they have any way to get any water or food. And I mean I just don't think it was something we could have turned our back on.

HOLMES (voice-over): And so they did not turn their backs. Soldiers, fresh from fierce combat have become zookeepers on a mission, to keep the animals who remain here alive.

NUSSIO: The lions who were just coming up out of this moot, one in particular, one of the male lions -- and he was standing right here -- and literally, reaching through the cage.

HOLMES: And it was something Major Nussio will never forget. One of the great things behind it was having that close personal contact with a lion. I don't think very many people would ever get that in your life and I certainly never thought going to combat in Baghdad I'd end up feeding a lion.

HOLMES: After the soldiers took the zoo and the park, they had to leave for just one night to continue the fight. In that time the zoo, like much of Baghdad, was looted. The cages torn open, birds gone, goats, too, pretty much anything that wouldn't bite back. We tried to close one door, the occupant of the cage too weak to attempt to escape anyway. The monkeys were simply turned loose.

(on camera): So you're in a situation where you've got monkeys in the trees.

NUSSIO: Yes. And there's not much we can do to get those monkeys back.

HOLMES: By the time the soldiers desperately wanting to protect the animals came back, bad had gone to worse.

(on camera): One of the most bizarre incidents witnessed by soldiers happened here at the outside fence. A camel, electrical cord wrapped around its neck, and a group of Iraqis trying to drag it over the fence. The soldiers intervened, the camel got away. He's still out there somewhere.

(voice-over): The plight of some of these animals is pitiful. Zoo workers long gone. Who knows how long these creatures went without? Pigs were once here, but no more. They had to be sacrificed. The meat rationed to feed the carnivores something.

NUSSIO: Here's the porcupines.

HOLMES: And near them, a wolf out of his cage, near death. Domestic dogs in their cages, one has died, the others emaciated.

For the soldiers here, one problem is the park's sheer size, several square kilometers. They shoo the locals away. The curious and the thieves and then they come back.

NUSSIO: He's doing much better, though.

HOLMES (on camera): Is he?

NUSSIO: Yes.

HOLMES: What's he been eating?

NUSSIO: A bird. Plus, I gave him a strip of beef jerky. He didn't seem to like that as much though.

HOLMES (voice-over): There's not even running water here. The soldiers and some locals carted in by hand, in this case to a grateful bear who curiously shares his cage with a dog. Back at the lion enclosure, we learn the wolf we saw earlier had died. He becomes meager rations for the hungry beasts, a morsel each and the rest of a skinny wolf is taken to the bears, the ocelot and the tiger.

NUSSIO: He's a beautiful animal, absolutely gorgeous. We'll get you something. We'll get you something.

HOLMES: Michael Holmes, CNN, at the Baghdad zoo.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: We wanted to find out more about efforts to help animals in Iraq and joining us now from Boston is John Walsh with the World Society for the Protection of Animals. The society is sending a team to help animals caught up in the war.

John, thanks for being with us. What is the greatest need in terms -- that the organization sees in Iraq right now in terms of animals?

JOHN WALSH, WORLD SOCIETY FOR THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS: As we do in any war zone, we break it up into various categories. One of the greatest problems affecting all of the animals of Iraq is that during the sanctions imposed on that government, there weren't a lot of veterinary supplies available. The wolf -- the fact -- that you mentioned that died, he didn't starve to death. That wolf had canine distemper virus simply because the animals weren't able to get any vaccinations.

So right across the board, there are no veterinary services functioning in Iraq today. So animals need to be treated. Any of the working animals of which there's a lot throughout Iraq -- donkeys, mules, horses, even water buffalo -- are extremely thin and this is due to the fact that they've got internal parasites because, again, there is no veterinary pharmaceuticals available.

The zoo and the Kuwait government and the U.S. military cooperated and got a couple of trucks up there with seven tons of food. So they are getting food now. We have, in conjunction -- we have a coalition of organizations that are going to be working on this particular situation. We're -- World SPAA, which is the Society of Protection of Animals Abroad, has two mobile veterinary clinics in Syria and one in Jordan, right at the border now, just getting clearance to go across. They each have two veterinary -- Arabic- speaking veterinarians and five veterinary technicians that are Arabic-speaking.

COOPER: And...

WALSH: And our team will...

COOPER: Sorry, John. We've got some pictures of some of the work you have done in other war torn places, I believe in Kuwait during the last Gulf War. I think we're looking right now at Kabul. Do you work with the U.S. military? I mean you talk about these other organizations you work with. Right now, obviously, the U.S. military on the ground in Iraq is, you know, probably the most organized. Are they being helpful?

WALSH: Yes. They actually diverted some vehicles to get the food. I -- in Kuwait, I ran the zoo as soon as the city was liberated. I had been in Saudi Arabia on cleaning the oil soaked birds. As soon as they liberated Kuwait City that night, I went up and ran the zoo for the next few months and there, the animal had bullets in them and that were really in tough shape. The Kuwait zoo donated a lot of the dry food, which will keep these animals ticking over until we get the zoological park workers to come back. They haven't been paid in a while, but they're in the zoo. I understand the veterinarian is now back as well.

COOPER: There are some who would probably hear about these efforts and say, you know, it's nice, but there are people in Iraq who are in need as well. But just from some of the reading I was doing and some of your work, it has -- your work has an economic impact on people's lives in Iraq. As you said, some of these animals are working animals.

WALSH: Yes, not only are they working animals. They're livelihood depends on them. As we found during the Bosnian war, that the sheep, the goats, the camel, the cattle, all of these animals have a lot of commercial value. That is their life savings -- is wrapped up in those animals, so the health and well being of those animals incredibly important to people in those countries.

COOPER: It's also a way, I suppose, of preventing disease. You have wild dogs running around the city.

WALSH: Well, dog control is another that thing we do. There's four projects we'll be working on in Iraq. The exotic animals because the generals -- you're going to find that some of the military guys, the -- they went into Iraq -- I mean, into Kuwait, they actually took the animals back and we asked them to return the zoo animals to Kuwait. And the Iraq government said we didn't take the animals, it was the military soldiers who took them for their own private garden.

So, one, we'll be looking at the problems with exotic animals. Two, we'll be looking at dog control, stray dog -- with significant dog population, the threat of rabies is always there in those war zones, in those affected cities. We'll be working on clinics for the working animals, setting up facilities where they can be treated because they're virtually worked to death in those countries, as well.

COOPER: All right, John, I appreciate you joining us. It's interesting. John Walsh, the World Society for the Protection of Animals. Good luck to you and your project in Iraq.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com







Aired April 27, 2003 - 10:40   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KELLI ARENA, CNN ANCHOR: Kuwaitis are reaching out to help bring relief to animals in trouble at Baghdad's main zoo. Feed and hay were loaded onto trucks to head to the Al Zara (ph) facility. When the Iraqi regime came tumbling down, the animals were left to suffer. CNN's Michael Holmes went to the zoo, his reporting and that of others helped bring about relief efforts.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Major Rick Nussio takes a soldier's precautions as he prepares to enter the building. Safety off, taking his time, peering in before he enters the lion's den because that is what this is.

MAJ. RICK NUSSIO, TASK FORCE COMMANDER: Yes, here's a big male. Yes, all of the cages are secure.

HOLMES: Welcome to Baghdad's zoo and some of its forlorned, listless residents. Six lions here who had their last meal two days ago courtesy of the U.S. Army. They will eat again later this day. This massive park in central Baghdad contains the city zoo. A few days ago, however, it was a battlefield, inside the red zone. Iraqi soldiers had set up artillery, antiaircraft guns. The animals deserted, ignored, no doubt, terrified. When the Army came through, the soldiers couldn't believe what they found.

NUSSIO: I figured it was somewhat surreal. I mean, you know, here we are, we're in the middle of the city and everybody's talked about urban combat for two or three months and next thing you know there's camels walking through our positions and monkeys in the tree and at night you have a lion roaming free. It was very surreal, very strange.

HOLMES: Not just lions and camels, but two bears listless and hungry, an ocelot and more.

(on camera): What was the level of concern for these animals among the soldiers?

NUSSIO: Well, I think it was just their state of helplessness. I mean here they are caged up. They have no water. They have no food nor do they have any way to get any water or food. And I mean I just don't think it was something we could have turned our back on.

HOLMES (voice-over): And so they did not turn their backs. Soldiers, fresh from fierce combat have become zookeepers on a mission, to keep the animals who remain here alive.

NUSSIO: The lions who were just coming up out of this moot, one in particular, one of the male lions -- and he was standing right here -- and literally, reaching through the cage.

HOLMES: And it was something Major Nussio will never forget. One of the great things behind it was having that close personal contact with a lion. I don't think very many people would ever get that in your life and I certainly never thought going to combat in Baghdad I'd end up feeding a lion.

HOLMES: After the soldiers took the zoo and the park, they had to leave for just one night to continue the fight. In that time the zoo, like much of Baghdad, was looted. The cages torn open, birds gone, goats, too, pretty much anything that wouldn't bite back. We tried to close one door, the occupant of the cage too weak to attempt to escape anyway. The monkeys were simply turned loose.

(on camera): So you're in a situation where you've got monkeys in the trees.

NUSSIO: Yes. And there's not much we can do to get those monkeys back.

HOLMES: By the time the soldiers desperately wanting to protect the animals came back, bad had gone to worse.

(on camera): One of the most bizarre incidents witnessed by soldiers happened here at the outside fence. A camel, electrical cord wrapped around its neck, and a group of Iraqis trying to drag it over the fence. The soldiers intervened, the camel got away. He's still out there somewhere.

(voice-over): The plight of some of these animals is pitiful. Zoo workers long gone. Who knows how long these creatures went without? Pigs were once here, but no more. They had to be sacrificed. The meat rationed to feed the carnivores something.

NUSSIO: Here's the porcupines.

HOLMES: And near them, a wolf out of his cage, near death. Domestic dogs in their cages, one has died, the others emaciated.

For the soldiers here, one problem is the park's sheer size, several square kilometers. They shoo the locals away. The curious and the thieves and then they come back.

NUSSIO: He's doing much better, though.

HOLMES (on camera): Is he?

NUSSIO: Yes.

HOLMES: What's he been eating?

NUSSIO: A bird. Plus, I gave him a strip of beef jerky. He didn't seem to like that as much though.

HOLMES (voice-over): There's not even running water here. The soldiers and some locals carted in by hand, in this case to a grateful bear who curiously shares his cage with a dog. Back at the lion enclosure, we learn the wolf we saw earlier had died. He becomes meager rations for the hungry beasts, a morsel each and the rest of a skinny wolf is taken to the bears, the ocelot and the tiger.

NUSSIO: He's a beautiful animal, absolutely gorgeous. We'll get you something. We'll get you something.

HOLMES: Michael Holmes, CNN, at the Baghdad zoo.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: We wanted to find out more about efforts to help animals in Iraq and joining us now from Boston is John Walsh with the World Society for the Protection of Animals. The society is sending a team to help animals caught up in the war.

John, thanks for being with us. What is the greatest need in terms -- that the organization sees in Iraq right now in terms of animals?

JOHN WALSH, WORLD SOCIETY FOR THE PROTECTION OF ANIMALS: As we do in any war zone, we break it up into various categories. One of the greatest problems affecting all of the animals of Iraq is that during the sanctions imposed on that government, there weren't a lot of veterinary supplies available. The wolf -- the fact -- that you mentioned that died, he didn't starve to death. That wolf had canine distemper virus simply because the animals weren't able to get any vaccinations.

So right across the board, there are no veterinary services functioning in Iraq today. So animals need to be treated. Any of the working animals of which there's a lot throughout Iraq -- donkeys, mules, horses, even water buffalo -- are extremely thin and this is due to the fact that they've got internal parasites because, again, there is no veterinary pharmaceuticals available.

The zoo and the Kuwait government and the U.S. military cooperated and got a couple of trucks up there with seven tons of food. So they are getting food now. We have, in conjunction -- we have a coalition of organizations that are going to be working on this particular situation. We're -- World SPAA, which is the Society of Protection of Animals Abroad, has two mobile veterinary clinics in Syria and one in Jordan, right at the border now, just getting clearance to go across. They each have two veterinary -- Arabic- speaking veterinarians and five veterinary technicians that are Arabic-speaking.

COOPER: And...

WALSH: And our team will...

COOPER: Sorry, John. We've got some pictures of some of the work you have done in other war torn places, I believe in Kuwait during the last Gulf War. I think we're looking right now at Kabul. Do you work with the U.S. military? I mean you talk about these other organizations you work with. Right now, obviously, the U.S. military on the ground in Iraq is, you know, probably the most organized. Are they being helpful?

WALSH: Yes. They actually diverted some vehicles to get the food. I -- in Kuwait, I ran the zoo as soon as the city was liberated. I had been in Saudi Arabia on cleaning the oil soaked birds. As soon as they liberated Kuwait City that night, I went up and ran the zoo for the next few months and there, the animal had bullets in them and that were really in tough shape. The Kuwait zoo donated a lot of the dry food, which will keep these animals ticking over until we get the zoological park workers to come back. They haven't been paid in a while, but they're in the zoo. I understand the veterinarian is now back as well.

COOPER: There are some who would probably hear about these efforts and say, you know, it's nice, but there are people in Iraq who are in need as well. But just from some of the reading I was doing and some of your work, it has -- your work has an economic impact on people's lives in Iraq. As you said, some of these animals are working animals.

WALSH: Yes, not only are they working animals. They're livelihood depends on them. As we found during the Bosnian war, that the sheep, the goats, the camel, the cattle, all of these animals have a lot of commercial value. That is their life savings -- is wrapped up in those animals, so the health and well being of those animals incredibly important to people in those countries.

COOPER: It's also a way, I suppose, of preventing disease. You have wild dogs running around the city.

WALSH: Well, dog control is another that thing we do. There's four projects we'll be working on in Iraq. The exotic animals because the generals -- you're going to find that some of the military guys, the -- they went into Iraq -- I mean, into Kuwait, they actually took the animals back and we asked them to return the zoo animals to Kuwait. And the Iraq government said we didn't take the animals, it was the military soldiers who took them for their own private garden.

So, one, we'll be looking at the problems with exotic animals. Two, we'll be looking at dog control, stray dog -- with significant dog population, the threat of rabies is always there in those war zones, in those affected cities. We'll be working on clinics for the working animals, setting up facilities where they can be treated because they're virtually worked to death in those countries, as well.

COOPER: All right, John, I appreciate you joining us. It's interesting. John Walsh, the World Society for the Protection of Animals. Good luck to you and your project in Iraq.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com