Indonesian Muslims celebrate Eid with mass prayers

Drone footage showed large crowds of people standing shoulder to shoulder outside the newly constructed Jakarta International Stadium for morning prayers, the first mass Eid gathering in two years in Indonesia since the coronavirus pandemic hit.

Residents welcomed the relaxed measures, which also allowed tens of millions of Indonesian Muslims to travel back to their hometowns to mark the festival, but remained cautious about infection risks from COVID-19.

For the past two years, the Southeast Asian nation of 270 million people has grappled with one of the highest rates of coronavirus cases in Asia, but in recent months it has loosened many of its pandemic restrictions after a sharp drop in infections.