The tigress, Arka, is named after the late warlord Zeljko Raznjatovic, known as Arkan, who used the rare wild cats as mascots for his "Tigers" paramilitary force during the Balkans wars of the 1990s.

She is kept in a private zoo in the northwestern town of Prijedor, whose owner, Slavisa Milakovic, obtained her from Arkan.

SRNA said the tigress had three cubs six weeks ago but refused to feed them. Two of the cubs died but Milakovic fed the remaining one and kept him warm in a room in his hotel.

He then donated the cub to Zagreb zoo, where another Siberian tigress appeared willing to adopt it.

The Siberian tiger is a critically endangered species. International environmental protection organisation WWF estimates there are only around 450 of the animals left living in the wild.

Arkan was accused by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) of committing war crimes in Bosnia and Croatia in the 1990s. He was shot and killed in a hotel in Belgrade in January 2000.

SPACE.WIRE