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Death toll of Egyptians in pilgrimage stampede rises to 122: minister

Xinhua, October 2, 2015 Adjust font size:

The number of Egyptian pilgrims killed in the lastest Hajj stampede in Saudi Arabia has risen to 122, an Egyptian minister said on Thursday.

"The number of injured Egyptian pilgrims has reached 16," official MENA news agency quoted Mohamed Mokhtar Gomaa, Egypt's Minister of Religious Endowments and head of the delegation of Egyptian pilgrims, as saying.

Saudi Health Ministry said last week that the death toll in the stampede in Mina, near the holy city Mecca, rose to 769 while 934 pilgrims were wounded.

The country hosts more than 2.5 million Muslims from all over the world during the pilgrimage season every year.

It was the second major accident involving massive casualties of pilgrims this month in Saudi Arabia.

Earlier in September, 111 pilgrims were killed and 331 others injured in a crane crash in the grand mosque of Mecca.

Saudi officials said the accident was beyond control as some pilgrims did not respond to the security instructions of the Saudi authorities.

Still, Saudi Arabia has faced bitter criticism from rival Iran, which lost some 465 citizens in the stampede, accusing the kingdom of lacking proper security plans to manage the pilgrimage season, a charge that has been dismissed by Saudi Arabia. Endit