Mecca Reopens after 7-Month Pause for Coronavirus

Saudi Arabia will re-open the Muslim Holy Places for the year-round Umrah pilgrimage on Sunday with extensive health precautions, seven months after Coronavirus Disease (Covid-19) prompted its suspension.

The umrah usually attracts millions of Muslims from across the world each year, reports Hindustan Times.

It will be revived in three phases, with only 6,000 citizens and residents already within the kingdom permitted to participate every day in the initial phase.

“In the first stage, the umrah will be performed meticulously and within a specified period of time,” Hajj Minister Mohammad Benten told state television last week, according to news agency Agence-France-Presse.

Benten said that the pilgrims will be split into groups to ensure social distance within the grand mosque of Mecca.

On Sunday, worshippers will be able to perform the rite of circling the holy Kaaba — a cubic structure inside the grand mosque to which Muslims around the world are praying — along socially distanced paths.

On October 18, the number of pilgrims will be increased to 15,000 per day, with a maximum of 40,000 people allowed to pray in the mosque.

Visitors from abroad will be allowed from 1 November, when the capacity will be expanded to 20,000 pilgrims, with 60,000 people allowed to enter the mosque.

The decision to resume the pilgrimage was in response to the desires of the Muslims at home and abroad to conduct the ritual and visit the holy sites, the Ministry of the Interior said last month.

The Ministry added that the umrah would be able to return to full capacity once the threat of the coronavirus pandemic has subsided.

Until then, the Ministry of Health will vet the countries from which pilgrims are permitted to enter on the basis of health risks.

Those wishing to conduct the Umra must apply through two mobile applications-one to register them free of coronavirus disease (Covid-19) and the other to obtain an authorisation.