A syndicated news story made its way into multiple English papers earlier this week claiming that arsonists with the Animal Liberation Front inadvertently killed dozens of birds in an attack on a zoo in Italy. Now the New York Times has reported that this may not be the case:

“A recent such protest in Italy turned nasty: so-called ecoterrorists attacked a bird sanctuary about 20 miles from Turin this week with Molotov cocktails, burning down structures and setting dozens of birds free.”

This sentence, buried in a somewhat-related story in today’s paper, directly contradicts the other report’s claim that activists burned down an aviary with 40 birds inside. Even more odd, however, is this report from an Italian paper that while claiming that 40 birds died, also includes two dozen photos of the damage — without a single photo of a dead bird.

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The group formed in 1977 after Watson, one of the founders of Greenpeace, became frustrated with the seminal environmental group’s hesitation to engage in direct action. Since then the group has faced down whalers year-after-year by literally chasing their ships around the open seas.

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