King Fahd to pay the expenses of Iraqi pilgrimages which they rejected
Saudi Arabia-Iraq, Politics, 3/20/1999

The Saudi minister of the Interior Prince Nayef Bin Abdul Aziz has announced that 18,000 Iraqi pilgrimages arrived at Hdidat Arar border area of the Saudi Northern border district with Iraq on Friday morning.

In a statement to the Saudi News Agency, the Saudi minister of the Interior said on Friday afternoon that despite the fact that the Iraqi pilgrims arrived late after the closing the borders for pilgrims, their great numbers and inability to pay the fees or expenses of their pilgrimage rituals, King Fahd Bin Abdul Aziz gave his instructions to facilitate the entry measures of these pilgrims and that " Saudi Arabia is to bear all the costs of their pilgrimage including accommodation, transportation and relevant fees."

Meantime, the Iraqi airlines said on Friday that the plane which transported the Iraqi pilgrimages to Saudi Arabia returned later in the day to Baghdad. A spokesman for the company said to AFP that the Iraqi plane Elusion 76 returned back to Baghdad on Friday at dawn. On Thursday the said Iraqi plane made its third trip to transport Iraqi pilgrimages to Saudi Arabia dispite the embargo imposed on Iraq. Later news today, saturday, said that the Iraqi pilgrimages returned back home after they refused King Fahd's offer to pay them all the costs of al-Haj rituals.

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