More than 1,300 pilgrims died in Mecca last week as they performed the haj in scorching heat, Saudi Arabia has said.
Temperatures in Mecca, where almost two million Muslims gathered for the annual ritual, exceeded 50C.
Climate scientists believe temperatures will continue to rise in the coming decades, posing a challenge for the gathering, which attracts Muslims from around the world. Muslims who are capable and have the means must perform haj once in their lifetime.
Fahd Al-Jalajel, the Saudi health minister, said 1,301 pilgrims had died over the six days of haj.
The ritual involves worshippers circling around the Kaaba, a cubic structure Muslims believe was built by Abraham, and then pacing between two mountains in the footsteps of his wife Hajar as she searched for water.
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The kingdom had placed a quota on pilgrims, who receive permits allowing them access to air-conditioned tents and buses.
However, hundreds of thousands of pilgrims skirted the regulations and travelled to Mecca using tourism visas, meaning they would have had no access to the air-conditioned facilities.
Jalajel told state television that 83 per cent of those who had died were unregistered and had “walked long distances under direct sunlight, without adequate shelter or comfort”.
The majority of the dead had come from Egypt, where the government has revoked the licences of 16 tourism companies it accused of facilitating the illegal pilgrimages and had referred them for prosecution.
Saudi Arabia, which prides itself as the custodian of Islam’s holiest sites, had advised the pilgrims to carry umbrellas and avoid staying out in the sun.
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A 2019 study led by a scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology projected “an increase in the frequency and intensity of future extreme danger heat stress events in Mecca during haj under both business as usual and mitigation scenarios”.
Mass deaths have happened during the ritual since the 7th century, but the Gulf kingdom has taken precautions to avert outbreaks of disease and stampedes after several disasters in recent decades.
In 1990 a tunnel stampede killed more than 1,000 people, and in 2015 another killed almost 1,500. In the same year, a crane collapsed into the Kaaba’s sanctuary and more than 100 people were crushed.
