Man killed in polar bear attack on camp

A polar bear has attacked a camping site and killed a foreign national in the remote Svalbard Islands on Friday.

Them an was rushed to the hospital in Longyearbyen where he was declared dead by doctors. Longyearbyen is the main settlement in Norway’ s Arctic Svalbard archipelago, which sits more than 500 miles north of the Norwegian mainland.

The attack occurred just before 4am and is being investigated, the governor’s office said. The victim’s identity and citizenship were not immediately given. No-one else was injured, but six people were admitted to hospital with shock.

A post- mortem will be conducted at the University Hospital of North Norway in Tromsoe, north of the Arctic Circle. The polar bear was found dead in a car park by the nearby airport after being shot by onlookers.

It was not clear whether the polar bear was one of two of the animals to have roamed the area this week, the governor’s office said.