Four Saudi children die of poisoning in Iranian hotel

Four children of a group of Saudi pilgrims died of poisoning in a hotel in north Iran, official IRNA news agency reported on Monday.

A total of 33 Saudi pilgrims were poisoned, including three thee-year-old boys and a 14-year-old girl who died in a hospital in the religious city of Mashhad, according to the report.

The pilgrims were poisoned by vapour from a substance used as pesticide in the hotel, state IRIB TV quoted Rassoul Dinarvand, who heads the Iranian Food and Medicine Organization, as saying.

The organization has banned the use of such poison in hotels, Dinarvand said, without naming the substance.

Further investigation is underway to determine whether its use was "deliberate" or not, Dinarvand said.

Millions of Iranians and foreign pilgrims go to the northwestern city of Mashhad annually to visit a renowned Shiite Muslim shrine. Endit