2010-02-27 04:46:49
Fri Feb 26, 11:23 am ET
MOSCOW (Reuters) A Russian chimpanzee has been sent to rehab by zookeepers to cure the smoking and beer-drinking habits he has picked up, a popular daily reported on Friday. An ex-performer, Zhora became aggressive at his circus and was transferred to a zoo in the southern Russian city of Rostov, where he fathered several baby chimps, learned to draw with markers and picked up his two vices.
"The beer and cigarettes were ruining him. He would pester passers-by for booze," the Komsomolskaya Pravda paper said.
It added he has now been transferred to the city of Kazan, about 500 miles east of Moscow, for rehabilitation treatment.
(Reporting by Tanya Ustinova, writing by Amie Ferris-Rotman)