At least 323 of them were Egyptians, all of them died due to the heat, except for one who suffered fatal injuries in the crush, two Arab diplomats told the agency on condition of anonymity. According to them, at least 60 more dead are Jordanians, reports eadaily.com.
Every year, tens of thousands of pilgrims try to enter Mecca illegally because they cannot afford expensive visas to perform Hajj. This puts them at risk: unregistered pilgrims are denied access to air-conditioned facilities provided by the Saudi authorities along the Hajj route.
The death toll is so high because of the large number of unregistered pilgrims, as their arrival caused chaos in the camps to help the faithful and prevented the stable operation of services, an Egyptian official in charge of the Hajj explained to AFP. According to him, the pilgrims were left without food, water and air conditioning for a long time, they died because "there was no place to hide."
