Zoo accused of painting donkeys to look like zebras

An Egyptian zoo insists that he did not paint a pair of donkeys to look like zebras.

The Cairo International Garden Municipal Park became a target of ridicule after an Egyptian student, Mahmoud Sarhan, posted images on Facebook of the suspicious beast. Sarhan said that the two zebras of the zoo were obviously painted donkeys, a point of view that has since been adopted by animal experts.

However, Zoo director Mohamed Sultan told a local radio station that his zebras are real, rejecting the claims that they are just painted donkeys, according to the BBC.

This is not the first time a zoo has painted donkeys to look like zebras. In 2009, a Gaza Zoo did the same thing, saying that he could not get real zebras because of an Israeli blockade.

"The first time we used paint but it does not look good," the owner of the zoo told Reuters. "Children do not know, so they call them zebras and they are happy to see something new."

In 2013, a Chinese zoo was criticized for trying to get a big dog like a lion. "The zoo absolutely tries to deceive us," said a visitor to the Chinese media. "They try to disguise the dogs as lions."

Zebras and donkeys, though they both look like horses, are different species. Donkeys are popular beasts of burden in developing countries and were domesticated thousands of years ago. The zebras, meanwhile, are mainly known for their black and white stripes.

Zebras also have black snouts, according to an expert. They are also bigger and less like donkeys than the animal on the viral photo, and do not have stained stripes.