Robot jockeys ride camels in Egyptian race - PHOTOS

In the Sharqeya Camel Race Festival in Egypt this week, robot jockey went head-to-head with human riders in many races.

The move toward robot jockeys has come about following growing international pressure over the use of children in camel racing. These children were widely reported to suffer human rights abuses, and several countries - including the United Arab Emirates and Qatar - have banned human jockeys outright.

Development of robot jockeys was started back in 2001, when Qatari authorities approached Swiss robotics manufacturer K-Team about creating an alternative to human jockeys in anticipation of a ban. Since the first working robots - by then smaller, lightweight models manufactured in Qatar in preference to the Swiss versions - debuted in 2004, they have become increasingly widely used across the Arab world.

In the Sharqeya Festival, on the outskirts of the city of Belbeis in Egypt, camel racers from many Arab countries competed in races split into categories that, much like horse racing, are based on the age of the camels and the length of the course.


/Metro.co.uk/

Click photos to enlarge: