Tehran: Iranian authorities organised a demonstration against Saudi Arabia’s management of the annual hajj on Friday, as it mourned 131 nationals among 717 pilgrims killed in a crush outside Mecca.
After the prayers, worshippers held a protest against the “mischievous and incompetent regime” in Riyadh, said the Islamic Propagation Coordination Council which organises state-sponsored demonstrations in Iran.
Muslim pilgrims sombrely resumed the final rites of Haj in Mecca on Friday.
“Yesterday’s stampede was a catastrophe. We were shocked, but we can do nothing, this was their fate,” said Lolo Omar, a pilgrim from Eritrea. “We wish that Allah will facilitate our pilgrimage.”
Omar, like the pilgrims involved in Thursday’s disaster, was headed toward a complex housing three columns that pilgrims pelt with pebbles in a symbolic stoning of the devil. Muslims believe the Prophet Ibrahim, or Abraham as he is known in the Bible, was confronted in this spot by the devil.
Egyptian survivor Wael Abdullah said he had reached Mina Thursday when he saw people pushing and shoving to get past one another down one of the narrow streets. People tripped over those in wheelchairs, who also fell to the ground.
