The death toll during the largest Muslim pilgrimage, the Hajj, has risen to more than 900, mainly due to extreme heat in Mecca, Islam’s holiest city, in Saudi Arabia.
However, according to the French news agency France-Presse (AFP), the number could well exceed a thousand as 1,400 missing pilgrims may have died from the heat, well above the 240 deaths recorded last year and out of the 922 already recorded this year by AFP.
Most of the pilgrims who died during the pilgrimage to Mecca in western Saudi Arabia were Egyptians, according to an Arab diplomat quoted by AFP, who assured that “all deaths are caused by the heat” in the region, where temperatures were above freezing this Wednesday. reached 51.8 degrees Celsius.