Japanese region asks army to cull bears as attacks spike

The governor of Japan's Akita, a mountainous northern prefecture, has called for the military's help to protect residents from an unprecedented wave of bear attacks.



"Exhaustion on the ground is reaching its limit," Governor Kenta Suzuki said in an Instagram post on Sunday. He said he planned to visit the defence ministry in person as soon as Tuesday to ask for its help with a bear cull. A defence ministry spokesperson said she was unaware of any planned visit.



Suzuki's plea came after a bear attack in Akita on Friday in which one person was killed and three others injured, amid a record number of attacks across the country this year.



Local authorities in Akita say 54 people have been killed or injured this year, up from 11 last year, while sightings have increased around six-fold to more than 8,000 incidents. Rising bear numbers and depopulation in rural areas are increasingly bringing people into contact with bears.



Many encounters have occurred in towns and villages where the animals forage for food, sometimes entering homes, and on at least two occasions, supermarkets.