Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 7
By Farhad Daneshvar – Trend:
Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has lashed out at Saudi rulers over Mina stampede that claimed hundreds of lives last year during Hajj ritual.
“If we do not say Mina stampede was premeditated, this incompetency and lack of prudence is a crime,” the official website of the leader quoted him as saying at a gathering of the relatives of Iranian victims of Mina stampede that took place last year near the holy city of Mecca.
“Saudi rulers did not even apologize to Muslim nations for Mina stampede, how indecent and shameless they are,” he added.
He further criticized those Muslim states that remained silent about the incident and said the Islamic Republic was the only country that slammed the Saudi government.
“Silence towards Mina stampede is a great calamity. Muslim nations are suffering and it is a disaster for the world of Islam,” Ayatollah Khamenei said.
“Islamic Ummah [Arabic word for nation] was bereaved in Mina stampede and about 7,000 people were killed, but no country other than Iran reacted and they remained silent,” he noted.
About 500 Iranian Hajj pilgrims were killed in Mina stampede last September.
Although Riyadh says that 770 individuals were killed in the incident, Iran, which had the greatest number of deaths among foreign nationals, has put the death toll at about 4,700.
The Mina tragedy came after, a massive construction crane collapsed onto the Grand Mosque in Mecca, killing more than 100 people, including a number of Iranians.
Ayatollah Khamenei earlier denounced Saudi Arabia’s management of the Hajj pilgrimage saying Saudi rulers were to blame for the deaths of hundreds of pilgrims in both incidents during last year’s rituals.
Reacting to Iran’s critic point, Saudi Arabia's top cleric, Abdul Aziz Al Sheikh, has said Iranians are “not Muslims.”
In turn, Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif hit back at Saudi cleric on his Twitter page.
