Lions and tigers and bears! Literally on the loose! Also so is Omar al-Bashir!

GlobalPost

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Need to know

Ever see the movie Jumanji? Well, something similar is underway in Tbilisi, Georgia, where various zoo animals are roaming the streets after a deadly flood swept the capital.

Torrential downpour hit Tbilisi late Saturday and early Sunday. The zoo there lies along the banks of the Vere River, which overflowed and caught the animals in their cages. Authorities in Georgia told media that among the escaped are 14 wolves, seven bears, six tigers, six lions and one hippo. 

It's definitely not all fun and games — the flood has left at least 10 people dead and the animals are most certainly terrified if they haven't already been shot dead or tranquilized. The hippo, which swam out of its enclosure and onto the central Heroes’ Square, according to the Washington Post, grabbed a few leaves off a tree before being shot with a tranquilizer dart in front of a Swatch store. At least one lion, one bear and a hyena did not fare as well. The Daily Mail has some quality photos.

Meanwhile, South Africa is also doing its best to catch something on the loose. Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir is making headlines again, this time for showing up at a summit in Johannesburg despite the International Criminal Court's warrant for his arrest. A South African court has issued a temporary ban on his leaving the country, as a result of the ICC calling for the leader to be detained at the summit. Bashir is wanted for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide in the Darfur conflict.

The call for Bashir's arrest first came in 2009. Why is he still out and about? He usually covers his own tail by traveling only to countries that have not joined the ICC — like Chad, Kenya and Nigeria, where anger at the ICC's perceived bias against Africa means calls for his arrest go ignored. South Africa admitted to being conflicted over the issue, but appears to have come down on the side of the court. They are insisting that Bashir remain in country until Monday, when the South Africa court will make a decision over whether to hand him over to the ICC.

The Hague-based ICC was established in 2002 as the world's only permanent independent body to try war crimes. Since then, it has opened nine cases in eight countries, all in Africa. 

To give you a sense of how seriously Bashir takes fresh calls for his arrest: After he got the news, Bashir posed for a photo op with leaders at the summit. 

Want to know

Since the fall of 2013 Egypt has seen a heavy crackdown on its LGBT community. The focus on transgender Egyptians, specifically transgender women, has been particularly brutal. 

“The anxieties that keep showing up in the press reports are mainly about masculinity and gender and the majority of the people who’ve been arrested have been transgender," said Scott Long, former director of the LGBT program at Human Rights Watch. “There's a sense that youth in general have gone astray and that long-haired revolutionaries are part of a continuum with people who have forgotten how to behave in a manly way,” said Long.

It's hard to imagine a silver lining, but at least people are talking about it. Perhaps one unintended consequence of the crackdown is that there is more awareness about what it is to be transgender.

And then there's "Catwoman," a badass 71-year-old retired judge and former Communist activist who was just sworn in as mayor of Madrid. Her real name is Manuela Carmena, and she rose from relative obscurity to unexpected power after igniting the imagination of a small army of left-wing illustrators and designers. Street art, meet the internet. The rest is history. 

Strange but true

So, there are plenty of places and events where nudity is encouraged, even celebrated — but a sacred site is probably not one of them. A group of foreign backpackers are now in trouble after they decided to strip down on top of Mount Kinabalu in Malaysia last month. So you don't make the same mistake, we've made a list of 11 places where shedding your clothes is perfectly acceptable. And legal. You're welcome.

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