Marmot-like animal sighted in Kuwait

Two Kuwaiti men on a desert safari in their oil-rich Gulf emirate sighted what they described as a strange animal resembling a marmot and running as fast as a squirrel, newspapers reported on Monday.

A 48-second U-Tub film showed the short-legged animal galloping aimlessly in Salmi desert in the emirate apparently because it was frightened by the four-wheel car that was trying to take shots of it.

Newspapers said the animal looks like a marmot but added it was the first time that such a species is sighted in Kuwait.

Marmots are generally large ground squirrels and most of them tend to live in mountainous areas. The groundhog is also sometimes called a marmot.