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44 Turks Die During Hajj in Saudi Arabia
A total of 44 Turkish pilgrims died of "natural causes" during the Hajj this year, the Anatolia News Agency reported on Friday.
Mehmet Nuri Yilmaz, head of the Turkish Religious Affairs Directorate, said at a press conference in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, on Thursday that there were no Turkish pilgrims were crushed to death in the stampede in the stoning of devil ritual in the holy site of Mina near Mecca.
But he added that three Turks died during the incident because of heart attack or high blood pressure.
Yilmaz said that Saudi Minister of Pilgrimage Mahmoud Bin Mohammad Safar told him that the stampede, which resulted in the deaths of 35 people this year, occurred because "many people were lying on the ground" when pilgrims rushed to one of the three huge pillars representing the devil.
The Saudi minister has promised that the kingdom would take stricter measures next year to prevent a similar incident from happening, Yilmaz said.
Some 130,000 Turkish pilgrims have so far completed their pilgrimage and the first group of 300 pilgrims, aboard two planes belonging to the Turkish Airlines and EgyptAir, returned to Istanbul on Thursday, he added.
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