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The names means "Dream come true" and was
chosen by China, the country of origin of the cub's parents.
The small male cub, survivor of two babies born on Aug. 4 at
Beauval zoo about 250 km south of Paris, until now went by the
name of Mini Yuan Zi after his father Yuan Zi, whose names
translates as Podgy.
Brigitte Macron, wife of President Emmanuel Macron, announced
the creature's official name at an event attended by China's
vice foreign minister, Zhang Yesui.
The cub lost his twin sibling barely two hours after their
August births, which were firsts in France.
The arrival of the panda parents in France back in 2012 was
billed in official circles as a sign of warming bilateral ties.
Mother Huan Huan and her partner Yuan Zi are due to return to
China in 2022 while the young panda is expected to stay in
France until the age of two or three.
The cub, weighing in at 142.4 grams at birth, opened his eyes
for the first time in mid-September and weighed 7.903 kilos as
of Dec. 4, the Beauval zoo said on its website.
While an adult female panda can weigh up to 125 kilograms (275
pounds), a baby panda often weighs was little as 120 grams (4
ounces) at birth - or 143 grams in this case. In the wild,
pandas typically give birth to a single infant, born tiny,
blind, pink and almost hairless.
France's dealings with pandas - vegetarians but nonetheless
burly bears with big claws - have not always been easy.
Former leader Valery Gisgard d'Estaing admitted decades after
his 1970s presidency that a panda jumped on him when he entered
its pen against zookeeper advice during a presidential visit to
Vincennes zoo, on the eastern edge of Paris.
(Writing by Brian Love; editing by Richard Lough)
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