Leo DiCaprio is a “real man”, according to Russian prime minister Vladimir Putin.
The two met in St. Petersburg on the final day of an international conference to protect tigers – with the Hollywood star braving a plane-crash scare to join the big event.
And he arrived with a gift of $1 million for the campaign to save the big cats.
“I would like to thank you for coming,” Putin said. “A man with less strong nerves might have refused and thought [the emergency landing] was a sign that you should not come.”
The actor, no stranger to trans-Atlantic tragedy after his role in Titantic, admitted that the thought did cross his mind, RIA Novosti reported.
Family connection
While DiCaprio has long campaigned for animal welfare, he also had a personal reason to come to Russia.
“The name of my ancestors was Smirnov,” he said. “I always wanted to bring my grandmother to St. Petersburg but that never came to fruition before she died two years ago.”
Although DiCaprio speaks no Russian himself, he was promised a warm welcome beside the Baltic.
“I’m sure that when you get to know St. Petersburg you will be proud of your Russian roots,” Putin told him.
Big cats
Aside from the star-gazing – which also featured supermodel Naomi Campbell and Russian rock star Ilya Lagutenko of Mumiy Troll – there was some serious discussion about how to save the world’s dwindling tiger population.
From the taiga of Russia’s far east to the depths of Bengal, the big cat is under threat from poaching and from loss of habitat, seeing the population in the wild plummet to as little as 3,000.
And Putin explained that Russia is planning a special programme to support the native tiger population and preserve the northern-most species of the big cat.
“We have to do much more,” said the PM. “However experts believe that at the moment we have the optimum number of tigers, based on the land that exists for them.
“It is not just territory, proper food supplies are equally important.”
The conference was attended by representatives of the 13 countries where tigers live and leaders of the WWF wildlife charity.
This year’s “Save the Tiger” campaign has raised $20 million, and the heads of state at the former have agreed a declaration to double the number of tigers in the wild by 2022.
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