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At least 118 Muslim pilgrims died in a stampede in Mina (near the holy city of Mecca) on April 9, the last day of the Haj, the sacred annual ritual pilgrimage to Mecca. Some 2 million Muslims had taken part in the Haj pilgrimage. The disaster followed the death at the 1997 Haj of more than 340 pilgrims in a fire on the outskirts of Mecca.
The tragedy occurred during the "stoning the devil ritual", a procedure which involved the pilgrims hurling stones at three pillars in Mina which symbolised the temptations of Satan. In order to gain access to the pillars the expectant throng of hundreds of thousands had to inch their way along the Jamraat Bridge in sweltering temperatures.
Disaster struck when the police opened a closed walkway which resulted in a sudden crowd surge; some pilgrims plummeted from the bridge, whilst others were trampled underfoot. The dead were mainly the elderly or infirm, many of whom had sat down to rest at the front of the throng whilst waiting for the walkway to be opened.
At least 217 Muslim pilgrims died in a fire on the outskirts of the holy city of Mecca on April 15. A further 1,290 pilgrims were injured in the fire, and diplomats quoted in British newspapers on April 17 said that they expected the death toll to rise.
The pilgrims were amongst some 2 million Muslims taking part in the Haj, the sacred annual ritual pilgrimage to Mecca. The fire had broken out on the Plain of Mena, some 14km from Mecca, where large numbers of pilgrims had erected tents. Some 70,000 tents were reportedly destroyed in the blaze, which was thought to have been started by an exploding cooking-gas cylinder. Most of the victims were believed to be Indians, Pakistanis and Bangladeshis.
Around 270 people were officially reported killed in a stampede during the annual haj Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca on May 23.
The deaths, whose number was confirmed on May 27, occurred during a ritual at Mina, 15 km from Mecca, in which pilgrims were required to throw stones at three rocks symbolising the devil. Most of the victims were said to be African. Saudi authorities blamed the accident on conditions "beyond human endurance". A similar stampede killed 1,426 Muslim pilgrims in Mecca in July 1990. News of the event came as part of a report by the Saudi Health Ministry on May 24 on the deaths of 829 pilgrims from old age and heart ailments. Referring to the stampede deaths, the report said that a further unspecified number of pilgrims had been killed by "intense crowding". Some 2,500,000 pilgrims were officially estimated to have arrived in the country for the pilgrimage to Mecca.
The death of 1,426 Moslem pilgrims when a tunnel collapsed in Mecca on July 2, during the Eid al-Adha (Feast of the sacrifices) at the end of the annual Haj (pilgrimage), led to strong criticism of the Saudi Arabian government from several Moslem countries.
The pilgrims, 680 of whom were later identified as Indonesian and some 600 as Turkish, died of suffocation or were trampled to death in a frantic attempt to escape, as an estimated 50,000 worshippers converged simultaneously on the 500-metre long al- Mu'aysam tunnel connecting Mecca to the pilgrim tent city of Mina, below Mount Arafat.
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