Knut is going knuts!

Knut the polar bear is a 'publicity-addicted psycho', says keeper as he risks his job to speak out

Knut has turned into a publicity-addicted psycho bear who must be removed from his adoring public as soon as possible.

...Markus Roebke, part of a team who cares for the celebrity bear, has risked his job by speaking out about his mental health.

"Knut must go and the sooner the better," he said, adding he should be put into a zoo or animal park that weans him from his addiction to celebrity.

"We are not allowed to have contact with him any more and have received letters that if we breach this order our jobs are on the line. He is too unpredictable to play with now.

"He is addicted to the whole show, the human adulation. It is not healthy.

"He actually cries out or whimpers if he sees that there is not a spectator outside his enclosure ready to ooh and aah at him.

"When the zoo had to shut because of black ice everywhere he howled until staff members stood before him and calmed him down."

...Zookeeper Roebke is not the only one to cast doubts on his sanity - a prominent animal conservationist went so far in January as to actually brand him "an animal psychopath."

Roebke went on: "The trouble is that he identifies himself as a human and not as a polar bear. And as long as he is with us he will always think of Thomas Doerflein, the keeper who brought him up when he was a baby, as his father.

"Knut needs publicity and that must change."

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