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Saudi Arabia deployed thousands of security forces and medical staff for emergency situation, but such a crush in Mina proves that there were a few people who did not carry out the policies they were supposed to, he mentions.

The high number of dead Iranians was “due to the inefficiency and mismanagement of the Saudi rulers in handling the largest gathering of Muslims”, the Hajj and Pilgrimage Organization, which oversees its citizens’ participation in the hajj, said in...

Ali Marashi, head of the Iranian Red Crescent medical center in Tehran, said Iran had given up hope that any of those missing were still alive.

He said Saudi authorities blocked a road used by hajj pilgrims to allow a royal convoy to pass through, causing the deadly convergence in Mina, a town on the outskirts of Mecca.

“That is an increase of 52 on the previous figures”, Saudi health minister Khalid al-Falih told a news conference. The death of more than 1,000 people is not a small issue.

AP reporter Aya Batrawy, speaking on Thursday’s All Things Considered, said that “from the survivors that I spoke to, they say that for them, it’s pretty clear that the Saudi authorities didn’t manage the crowds properly”.

An official of the Telangana State Haj Committee told IANS that the deceased had been identified as Bibi Jaan, a resident of Ranga Reddy district near Hyderabad.

They all shed symbols of worldly materialism, a state known as “ihram”.

Officials on Saturday reported that Masnauli Hasibuan, who left for Mecca from Medan, North Sumatra, and Siti Rasmi Darmini, from Karawang, West Java, died in the incident.

Saudi authorities are investigating the accident but have pledged that the annual Hajj pilgrimage will go ahead as planned.