Horsetalk.co.nz - Full ArticleNeil Clarkson | 8 April 2016
The Emirates Equestrian Federation will undoubtedly be distressed that its plans to host the World Endurance Championships in Dubai this December have been scuppered by the FEI Bureau.
The bureau, meeting in Switzerland this week, decided that the United Arabs Emirates (UAE) still had welfare concerns in endurance that needed to be resolved before it could host the event.
Or, to frame it in the bureau’s own words: “The FEI Bureau is of the opinion that the UAE national federation is not currently in a position to guarantee that horse welfare would be fully protected at an FEI World Endurance Championship in the UAE this year.”
Stripping a world championships from a nation in such circumstances is a pretty big deal, and I don’t doubt that the Emirates Equestrian Federation will be smarting from the news for some time.
The event had been under a cloud over welfare concerns in the sport in the UAE for a while, and in recent weeks several strong endurance nations signalled that they were unlikely to go if was held in the country...
Read more: http://www.horsetalk.co.nz/2016/04/08/world-endurance-championships-uae-vets-out/#ixzz45FLjgbN6
