Iran Postpones Dispatch of Umrah Pilgrims
The first batch of pilgrims were scheduled to leave Tehran’s Imam Khomeini (RA) International Airport for the Arab country on Tuesday, December 19, but their flight has been put off for two weeks.
The Iranian Hajj and Pilgrimage Organization has set January 3 as the new date for the launch of the Umrah pilgrimage flight, according to a report by Fars news agency.
Earlier, head of the organization Seyed Abbas Hosseini said 70,000 Iranian pilgrims would travel to Saudi Arabia for Umrah by February 29, ahead of the holy month of Ramadan.
He said they would make the pilgrimage in 550 batches.
They will stay in Saudi Arabia for ten days, including five days in Mecca and five days in Medina, Hosseini stated.
Noting that 5.7 million Iranians are in line waiting for their turn to take part in Umrah pilgrimage, he added that the organization is ready to send between 800,000 and 1 million pilgrims to Saudi Arabia for Umrah every year if the conditions are right and other related bodies provide the necessary cooperation.
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Umrah differs from Hajj in that the latter is a lengthier visit which is done once a year and performed once in a lifetime by able-bodied Muslims who can afford it.
Iran stopped sending Umrah pilgrims to Saudi Arabia after two Iranian teenage boys were harassed in an airport in the Saudi city of Jeddah in March 2015.
That came nearly a year before the two countries cut their diplomatic relations.
Iran and Saudi Arabia re-established diplomatic ties in March 2023 through a China-mediated agreement, marking a significant development after severing relations in 2016.
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