Seavey to skip Iditarod for second straight year

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Seavey to skip Iditarod for second straight year

2019-01-26 08:40 Last Updated At：08:50

Dallas Seavey, the four-time Iditarod champion who skipped last year's race after being accused in a dog-doping scandal, will race again this year in Norway even though he has been cleared of any wrongdoing by officials in the Alaska race.

Seavey said Friday that he plans to compete in the Finnmarkslopet race in Norway, which starts about a week after the Iditarod, considered the world's most famous sled dog race. The Iditarod begins March 3.

After the 2017 race, in which Seavey placed second, race officials said some dogs on his team tested positive for an opioid painkiller. They said they could not prove he gave the drug tramadol to his dogs and didn't punish him.

Seavey adamantly denied giving his dogs drugs and sat out the 2018 race in protest, opting to race in Norway instead.

This past year, after four new board members were installed on the race's governing body, the Iditarod Trail Committee, the board cleared Seavey of any wrongdoing.

"After several meetings with Dallas Seavey, and review of all relevant information and evidence, the board does not believe that Dallas had any involvement with, or knowledge of, the events that led to the positive test in his team," a December release said. "The ITC concludes that it is not credible that Dallas was involved, and he is found to have committed no wrong doing. Whatever happened was completely beyond his control."

Seavey told The Associated Press on Friday that no one should interpret this as him having hard feelings against the Iditarod. Instead, he has unfinished business in Norway, where he came in third last year.

"It's a puzzle I haven't yet figured out, and I want to go back over there and give it another run," he said. "I feel like I'm much better prepared now to set my team up for success on the race, knowing what the race is like."

The 31-year-old Seavey said he has been around the Iditarod since he was 5 years old, and his family's history with the race traces back to his grandfather, Dan Seavey, who ran the first two races in 1973 and 1974.

"I'll be back to the Iditarod," he said, describing the draw of the Finnmarkslopet this year as "an exciting adventure."

Chas St. George, the interim head of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race, said he believes the decision to run in Norway was the right one for Seavey. Besides the Iditarod, Seavey has also won the Yukon Quest International Sled Dog Race between Canada and Alaska.

"He is a competitor, and I'm sure he would like to be the first to win all three," St. George said in an email.

Seavey said he doesn't have a major sponsor, and the only hitch in this plan would be funding. The Alaska man needs to raise about $25,000 for training and travel costs associated with getting himself and at least 14 dogs to Norway and back.

He also needs to offset the lower prize money in Norway. Last year, he said, he collected about $5,000 for finishing third. By contrast, Dallas' father, Mitch Seavey, picked up just over $39,000 for placing third in last year's Iditarod. Norwegian Joar Ulsom collected about $50,000 and a new pickup for winning his first Iditarod.

Dallas Seavey won the Iditarod, the annual thousand-mile race between the Anchorage area and Nome, in 2012, 2014, 2015 and 2016.

Blinken arrives in Haiti to show US support for fighting gang violence

2024-09-06 15:57 Last Updated At：16:01

PORT-AU-PRINCE, Haiti (AP) — U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived Thursday in Haiti to reaffirm the U.S. government’s commitment to a multinational mission to fight gangs in the Caribbean country and push for long-awaited general elections as he supported consideration of a peacekeeping operation.

Some 400 Kenyan police have been deployed to Haiti to lead a U.N.-backed mission to quell gang violence in the Haitian capital and beyond, but concerns have grown that the mission lacks resources.

“At this critical moment, we do need more funding, we do need more personnel to sustain and carry out the objectives of this mission,” Blinken told reporters.

He added that the U.S. is working to renew the mission, “but we also want to make sure that we have something that’s reliable, that’s sustainable. We’ll look at every option to do that. A peacekeeping operation would be one such option.”

On Wednesday, Brian Nichols, U.S. assistant secretary for Western Hemisphere affairs, confirmed the U.S. government is considering a U.N. peacekeeping operation as one way to secure money and resources to fight gangs that control 80% of Haiti’s capital.

Many Haitians have rejected the proposal of another peacekeeping operation, given the introduction of cholera and sexual abuse cases that occurred when U.N. troops were last in Haiti.

Blinken arrived a day after Haiti’s government extended a state of emergency to the entire country. It had been imposed earlier in the year in the capital and surrounding areas in an attempt to stem the ongoing violence.

Blinken met with Haitian Prime Minister Garry Conille and a nine-member transitional presidential council that was created after former Prime Minister Ariel Henry resigned. He also met with unspecified political party leaders, the head of the multinational mission and the chief of Haiti’s National Police.

He said the discussions centered in part on how to ensure that security personnel are well-trained, well=equipped and held accountable, adding that there's a “clear plan” on the mission's next steps. Talks also focused on the need to hold general elections.

“That is the critical next step,” he said. “We want to make sure Haiti is back on a clear democratic track.”

Haiti last held elections in 2016, and officials since then have blamed gang violence and political upheaval for preventing them from holding new ones.

In July 2021, former President Jovenel Moïse was assassinated, and gang violence since then has surged. In February, gangs launched coordinated attacks on police stations and the main international airport, which remained closed for nearly three months. They also stormed Haiti’s two largest prisons, releasing more than 4,000 inmates.

The violence subsided somewhat before the first contingent of Kenyan police arrived in late June, with Blinken noting that economic activity has restarted in some areas of Port-au-Prince, and that joint operations have led to successes including regaining control of Haiti's biggest public hospital.

However, gangs continue to attack communities surrounding Port-au-Prince.

“Taking back the streets from gangs is critical,” Blinken said.

After meeting with officials in Haiti, Blinken is scheduled to fly Thursday night to the Dominican Republic, which shares the island of Hispaniola with Haiti.

On Friday, he is scheduled to meet with Dominican President Luis Abinader and other officials before returning to the U.S. later that day.

Nichols said the talks with Abinader will focus on three priorities: strengthening economic ties, advancing values including respect for human and labor rights and promoting increased security in the region, especially in Haiti.

Abinader has come under fire in recent years for his administration’s treatment of Haitian migrants and those born in the Dominican Republic to Haitian parents.

He also has largely closed the airspace with Haiti and is building a wall between the two nations.