Saudi Arabia allows international pilgrims to enter for Umrah

Some 10,000 international pilgrims appear in Saudi Arabia to conduct Umrah after a seven-month halt because of the coronavirus pandemic.

The travellers must quarantine for three days after landing before being transported to sacred sites, as per Amr Al-Maddah, deputy minister of Hajj and Umrah.

However, the deputy minister stated that the pilgrims could only have a 10-day stay in the kingdom.

Furthermore, he stated that all pilgrims would be tested for coronavirus any positive cases would be monitored closely.

Millions of Muslims from around the world often travel to Saudi Arabia for Hajj and Umrah pilgrimages, and these are two common rites while the Hajj is held one in a year is a long ritual that is a once in a lifetime duty for all Muslims.

The largely symbolic Hajj earlier this year was limited to only domestic worshippers of Saudi Arabia. The authorities allowed citizens and residents to perform the Umrah with only 6000 pilgrims a day which is less than the 30 percent capacity.

In 2019, over 19 million pilgrims visited for Umrah in Saudi Arabia. Before the coronavirus pandemic, over than 1,300 hotels and numbers of stores hummed round the clock to provide to travellers attending the sacred cities of Mecca and Medina. Those have been mostly vacant in recent months due to the coronavirus.

Due to coronavirus guidelines, the worshippers are now not permitted to the holy Kaaba – a stone structure draped in black cloth embellished in gold with verses from the Quran. T

The Kaaba is the holiest structure in Islam and the way that Muslims face to pray; touching it is deemed a great honour that pilgrims cherished in the past.

Pilgrimage is the determination of a plan to develop tourism under Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s initiative to diversify the economy of the world’s top oil exporter. It endeavoured to boost Umrah visitors to 15 million by 2020, a plan interrupted by the coronavirus pandemic, and to 30 million by 2030.

The religious pilgrimage generates $12bn in wealth from worshippers’ lodging, transport, gifts, food and fees, according to official data.