Winx’s Brother Killed For Meat Despite Export As A Thoroughbred, Report Says

Winx, the champion racehorse fêted by the divine trinity of bookmakers, The Daily Telegraph, and Prime Minister Scott Morrison, had a half-brother named Bareul Jeong. Bareul Jeong is long dead. Bareul Jeong was slaughtered for meat in a South Korean abattoir years before Winx won 33 races in a row, according to a Guardian Australia report on Australia’s ties to the world of international thoroughbred knackeries.

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That information comes as part of a scathing report on the treatment of former racehorses in South Korea’s abattoirs, and a lack of accountability on behalf of Australian racing authorities. The Guardian Australia reports that leaked footage, shot at a South Korean abattoir last year and distributed by PETA, shows Australian thoroughbred Dynamic Tank – who was purchased at the famous Magic Millions sale – waiting in a truck before its death. The footage shows other horses being beaten with PVC pipes while still on the truck, among other brutal practices which wouldn’t fly in local slaughterhouses.

Some of the conditions shown in the video are reportedly being investigated by South Korean authorities.

The Guardian Australia reports that because Dynamic Tank and other Australian horses like it were exported for racing or breeding purposes, they do not classify as livestock. That means Australian authorities are not compelled to ensure their humane treatment throughout the food supply chain; as Australian breeders didn’t explicitly sell them for their meat, those thoroughbreds are allegedly subjected to dire conditions without the same end-to-end oversight Aussie regulators give to other live exports.

Although RSPCA chief scientist Dr Bidda Jones told Guardian Australia the conditions shown in the video would not meet the standards required in the livestock industry, a spokesperson for agriculture Bridget McKenzie added that “what happens [to exported thoroughbreds] months or even years later is a matter for that country.”

In a statement, PETA representative Emily Rice said if the Korean Racing Association “redirected just a tiny fraction of the profit it makes off the backs of these horses into retirement programmes, this would spare thousands of them a terrifying death.”

Proposals for legislation forcing Australian regulators to increase their oversight of exported thoroughbreds come too late for horses like Dynamic Tank, and the other Australian thoroughbreds killed in the meat trade. Winx appears to have escaped that particular fate, but the latest report suggests a very shitty existence for some exported thoroughbreds who weren’t quite as successful on the track. Read about it here.

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