(October 2nd, 2012)

Sunday, September 30th, once again at the infamous racetrack in Merano, during the Autumn Grand Criterium, a horse was the victim of a bad fall as a result of which he was put down.

The images are shocking: Errante, only three years old, falls while jumping a fence. He has a broken leg (and perhaps other traumas), but he gets up and tries to walk with his leg dangling. He is then put down by the vet.
WATCH THE VIDEO (we apologize for the quality of the movie)

Errante as well - as Catbar, Nobel, Mister Red Shine and who knows how many others - lost his young life in a racecourse in absolute silence: not a word from the horse racing associations, concerned only with fighting among each other and with asking money to the Government in an attempt to revive this so called sport. Not a word from those involved in the race.

Four more horses fell in a subsequent race, the Grand Prix Merano Forst. There condition is unknown.

The IHP is against horse racing and the equestrian sports, but in this case we urgently ask the Ministry of Agriculture to intervene and impose rules to stop this massacre, dictated by the lack of professionalism of breeders and trainers who often send on the track, to run steeple chase races, horses not prepared to face hedges and obstacles: horses who are probably discarded from gallop races.