Leopard kills child in Nepal =

Kathmandu (dpa) - A 5-year-old girl was eaten by a leopard near a village in far-western Nepal, local media reported Friday, the latest in a series of leopard attacks.

The leopard entered the village in Baitadi district early Wednesday and took off with the child, the Kathmandu Post daily reported.

The remains of the child's body were recovered from a field the next day.

People in at least 10 villages in the district have experienced leopard attacks.

Six people have been killed in the last five months, the report said. More than two dozen leopard attack deaths were reported in the last two years.

The authorities deployed a team of security personnel five months ago to capture the leopard they believe is responsible for the attacks, but without success. Additional security was to be called in to track down the animal, the report said.

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## Internet
- [Kathmandu Post report](http://dpaq.de/H5soK)

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## dpa Contacts
- Reporting by: Pratibha Tuladhar
- Editing by: Sean Sampson
Tel: +66 2 7142073; <englishservice@dpa.com>                                
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Climate change threatens Nepal’s snow leopards =

   Kathmandu (dpa)- A study by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Tuesday warned that the snow leopards in the Himalayas are threatened by climate change.

   Warming at high elevations in the Himalayas is occurring at rates higher than the global average, according to the WWF.

   The report says 30 per cent of snow leopard habitats in the region may be lost if greenhouse gas emissions continue to increase. Warmer and wetter conditions in the Himalayas will result in forests ascending into alpine areas, which is the snow leopard’s habitat.

   “If the treeline shifts upward, as our research predicts it will, we’re looking at the snow leopard faced with diminishing options for where it can live,” said Jessica Forrest, a WWF researcher and one the study’s authors.

   The, snow leopards live in areas generally below 5,000 meters. The endangered species are found in the mountains of northern and central Asia, including the Himalayas. Their number is between 4,000 to 6,5000. Some 500 of them live in Nepal’s mountains.

   “Loss of alpine habitat not only means less room for snow leopards, but also has the potential to bring them closer to human activities like livestock grazing,” said WWF snow leopard expert and study co-author Rinjan Shrestha.

   “As grazing intensifies and the leopards’ natural prey decline, they could begin preying more heavily on livestock, resulting in increased retaliatory killings.”
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