Pamela Anderson campaigns for seals in Paris

PARIS (Reuters) - Former Baywatch star Pamela Anderson followed in the footsteps of French actress Brigitte Bardot on Thursday by campaigning in Paris for the protection of baby seals.

Anderson was to perform a burlesque striptease later at the Crazy Horse cabaret to the tune of 'Harley Davidson', a song written by Serge Gainsbourg and sung by Bardot in the late 60s.

Anderson said she would deliver a letter from Bardot to the Canadian ambassador to France urging him to stop seal hunting around the Arctic.

"It sickens me not just as a Canadian but as a human being," the 40-year-old actress told a room crammed with photographers shouting for her attention at Bardot's animal rights foundation.

Anderson also called on fashion designers and consumers to boycott pelts and seal products, which Canada defend as a traditional source of trade that helps balance the ecosystem.

"The hunt was dead for 20 years, and has been revived not to honor local customs or conserve cod stocks but because new markets for fur have opened up in Russia and China," she said.

Anderson played a short video that showed hunters yelling before clubbing seals and dragging bloodied bodies across the ice while a woman sobbed on the soundtrack.

Bardot, 73, wished her luck via speakerphone from her home in the southern resort city of St. Tropez.

"You are my Valentine, I kiss you," Bardot said.

Anderson's Crazy Horse act, originally planned for two nights but reduced to one, involves a Harley Davidson motorcycle.

Reuters/Nielsen