Around 2,500 seals were found dead on the Caspian Sea coast in southern Russia, officials said. Initial reports had said that 700 dead seals had been found on the coast. However, after further investigation, the Russian ministry of natural resources and environment raised the figure to about 2,500, which is expected to rise even more, Guardian reported.
Read more: Video: Students protest at China's Wuhan university against Covid rules
Officials said that the seals likely died due to natural causes as the head of the Caspian Environmental Protection Center Zaur Gapizov said that the deaths seem to have happened about two weeks ago. There is no evidence to suggest the animals were killed or caught in fishing nets, he added.
Experts at the Federal Fisheries Agency have collected samples from the seals to understand the exact cause of the deaths.
Read more: In videos, Indonesia's Semeru volcano erupts, spewing hot ash as thousands flee
Caspian seals are classified as endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) red list since 2008. The number of Caspian Sea seals has fallen drastically over the past few decades. The fisheries agency puts the overall number of Caspian seals at 270,000-300,000, while the Caspian Environmental Protection Center says there are only about 70,000 of them left.
{{/usCountry}}Caspian seals are classified as endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) red list since 2008. The number of Caspian Sea seals has fallen drastically over the past few decades. The fisheries agency puts the overall number of Caspian seals at 270,000-300,000, while the Caspian Environmental Protection Center says there are only about 70,000 of them left.
{{/usCountry}}Several more such deaths have been reported this year.