Foreign Ministry committee following up missing pilgrims issue

TEHRAN, Oct. 12 (MNA) – Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister for Arab and African Countries has announced that a committee in his Ministry is tracking all missing pilgrims including Ghazanfar Roknabadi.

“The committee consists of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and other relevant departments in the country and seeks to determine the final status of all Iranian pilgrims who went missing as a result of the Mina Tragedy,” noted Hossein Amir-Abdollahian.

Amir-Abdollahian further stressed that, “we are still searching for the 65 missing Iranian including our two colleagues at the Foreign Ministry Mr.Roknabadi and Mr.Fahima.”

The Mina accident took place during the Hajj rituals on the day of Eid al-Adha due to mismanagement of Saudi authorities.

More than 4000 pilgrims from different countries were killed in the disaster including 465 Iranian pilgrims.

So far, the bodies of 308 victims of the disaster have been transferred to the country while the whereabouts of 65 victims is still unknown.

A total of 64 thousand Iranian pilgrims had travelled to Saudi Arabia to perform Hajj rituals.

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News ID 110933