Saudi Arabia will only allow residents of the country to make a pilgrimage to Mecca

The Saudi Arabian Ministry of Pilgrimage announced today that this year only a limited number of people of different nationalities who are already in the Kingdom will be able to make the pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca or "hach" because of the danger still posed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Saudi kingdom had asked to suspend travel plans for the annual pilgrimage to Mecca, scheduled for the end of July, but so far it had not made a decision on the massive religious event, keeping millions of pilgrims around the world on edge. 

Finally, the decision has been taken "in light of the persistence of this pandemic," so that "the ritual is safe" and "complies with preventive measures and social distancing," according to a statement from the ministry in charge of the pilgrimage. It also indicated that the limitation of the number of pilgrims is intended to "preserve the human soul" in accordance with Islamic law. 

The annual pilgrimage to Mecca is one of the five pillars of Islam, which every Muslim must make once in his lifetime if physical and economic conditions allow it. 

Saudi Arabia had already suspended the "umrah" or minor pilgrimage in March, which can be done throughout the year and which attracts millions of pilgrims, who spend up to 26 billion Saudi rials (about $7 billion) annually, according to estimates by the Mecca Chamber of Commerce.

Nowadays, the authorities reopened around 1,500 mosques in the holy city, after three months of closure due to the coronavirus, the last in the country to receive the faithful again.  

Today, Saudi Arabia is one of the countries in the region most affected by COVID-19, with more than 3,000 cases of coronavirus per day and a total of 161,005 infected and 1,307 dead. 

However, this is not the first time that the pilgrimage has been restricted for health reasons. During the Ebola outbreak in West Africa between 2014 and 2016, the kingdom banned the entry of pilgrims from countries such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, whose nationals were also banned last year.  

In 2019, almost two and a half million Muslims came to Mecca for the "hach", including more than 600,000 Saudis, in addition to 19 million who came for the "umrah", according to official figures.