Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin slipped into a wetsuit on Friday and clipped a radio transmitter onto a beluga whale named Dasha, news agencies reported.Putin, who is known as a nature and wildlife enthusiast as well as Russia's strongman premier, performed the aquatic manoeuvre on Chkalov Island off Russia's Pacific coast during a visit to the country's Far East.He did so after meeting scientists who were on the island studying migration patterns of the beluga, a Northern Hemisphere sea mammal that conservation groups say is threatened by hunting and oil and gas development."Then Putin changed into a wetsuit and, in accordance with the instructions given, used a pincer to clip a transmitter onto the hump of a beluga with the nickname Dasha," Interfax wrote.News agencies reported that Putin got into the water up to his waist and jokingly asked one of the scientists: "It won't eat us, will it?""It won't eat anyone, but it could spray you," a scientist replied."Probably if it gets angry," Putin said.Once scientists confirmed that the transmitter was attached properly, Putin told the whale, "Don't be angry anymore," RIA-Novosti reported. Then the prime minister and a group of fishermen helped release Dasha into the sea.Though Putin is better known in the West for his muscular foreign policy, the president-turned-prime minister has occasionally shown compassion for animals, winning praise from environmental groups.In February, he denounced the hunting of young seals as a "bloody business," leading Russian officials to swiftly ban the practice, and last October he was shown on television cuddling a tiger cub he had received as a birthday gift.
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