PlusOil Companies Protected if They Harm Polar BearsOil Companies Protected if They Harm Polar BearsThe Associated PressThe Fish and Wildlife Service issued regulations this week providing legal protection to seven oil companies. The companies are planning to search for oil and gas in the Chukchi Sea off the northwestern coast of Alaska. (June 14)[Notes:ANCHOR VOICE] [Notes:Dateline Washington][Notes:NATS UP "Today I am listing the polar bear as a threatened species under the endagered specis act"] That was just four weeks ago.But now the Bush administration is giving oil companies permission to annoy ... and potentially harm ... Polar bears.The Fish and Wildlife Service issued regulations this week providing legal protection to seven oil companies.Those companies plan to search for oil and gas off the northwestern coast of Alaska. That's where the government auctioned off oil leases to ConocoPhillips ... Shell Oil and five other companies for more than two-and-a-half billion dollars.The new wildlife service regulations mean it will be O-K legally if `small numbers' of polar bears or Pacific walruses are harmed over the next five years.But environmentalists say the new regulations give oil companies a blank cheque to harass the polar bear.Just over ten percent of polar bears in the Arctic live in and around the Alaskan coast. ___ ___, The Associated Press.(****END****)