A lion trainer is reportedly being questioned by police in Saudi Arabia after his animal attacked a young girl at a festival in Jeddah.
According to local media, the attack took place this week at the Jeddah Spring Festival where children were allowed to run around with the six-month cub as part of a show.
Video footage on YouTube shows that the cub cornered a young girl, stood on its hind legs and grabbed her head with its paws as a horrified audience looked on.
The video shows one adult in the enclosure during the show pull the girl to safety.
“The children were delightfully playing and the lion seemed to have been attracted by the butterfly ribbon on the head of the girl,” Faisal Aseeri, the Saudi trainer who owns a small zoo was quoted as saying by Saudi news site Al Marsad.
Reports suggest the girl was not badly hurt. “The cub is only six months old and its claws had been removed to make sure it did not harm children during the play,” Aseeri added.
In November 2016, a young girl in Saudi Arabia was attacked by a tiger during a promotion show.
The attack, captured by an onlooker on video, occurred in an open space near a market in Sakaka in the northwestern part of the kingdom.
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