Bogota, July 17 (DPA) The killing of a hippopotamus that escaped from a private zoo once owned by slain drug lord Pablo Escobar has sparked public outrage in Colombia.

Pepe, a two-tonne hippo, was shot dead June 18 in a government-ordered killing near the town of Puerto Berrio, about 160 km northwest of Bogota. Photographs surfaced last week of the carcass surrounded by 15 gun-toting soldiers in fatigues, reminiscent of a trophy shot.

Pepe was part of a family of 23 and a descendent of hippos originally imported from Africa in 1981 by Escobar, then-leader of the Medellin cocaine cartel.

Known for his eccentricity, Escobar had imported scores of exotic animals including elephants, rhinos, hippos and kangaroos, which were kept in a zoo on his estate in Puerto Truinfo in the northwestern Colombian region of Antioquia.

A prominent display at the entrance to Hacienda Napoles, the 5,500-acre ranch, was the airplane in which Escobar smuggled his first load of cocaine into the US.

Escobar was killed by Colombian security forces in 1993, and the government took over the estate.

Pepe and his mate, Matilda, managed to escape the zoo in 2006 and, apparently thriving in the wild, even produced a calf, popularly dubbed Pepito.

In May, the Fundacion Vida Silvestre Neotropical, a non-profit organisation whose goal is sustainable management of Colombian wildlife, got a permit to kill the runaway hippos on the grounds that they endangered people and the ecosystem.

The foundation sought military backing to kill the animals and hold back farmers and peasants in the area who would want to protect Pepe and family.