February 4, Pozirk. Former Interior Minister Ihar Šunievič, chairman of the Belarusian Society of Hunters and Fishers, has expressed frustration over hunters’ failure to kill dozens of lynxes during the hunting season, which ran from November 2025 to January 31, 2026.
According to him, hunters shot only six lynxes incidentally, even though his society had authorized the killing of 57 animals.
“It was a complete failure of the season,” he said, noting that hunters lacked both permission to conduct drive hunts and sufficient experience in hunting lynxes, a species that had been protected for about 40 years until recently.
The Belarusian government authorized lynx hunting in April 2025. A permit to kill a lynx costs 200 rubles ($70) for nationals of Eurasian Economic Union member states and 500 rubles ($174) for hunters from other countries.
