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Tuesday 09 February 2010 02:18 GMT

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2.5 million Muslims converge on Mecca
Wed, 25 Nov 2009 11:52:33 GMT
More than 2.5 million pilgrims from all over the world have converged on the holy city of Mecca for the annual Islamic Hajj ritual, one of the five pillars of Islam.

The pilgrims were due in the holy city by late Tuesday in time to begin the Hajj rites on Wednesday, day one of the six-day season.

The rites begin with the "tawaf," the circling seven times of the cubic Kaaba building in the center of the Grand Mosque, in whose direction all Muslims around the world pray.

Pilgrims then proceed to Mina to spend the night before climbing Mount Arafat on Thursday.

The Grand Mosque can hold more than one million people, but the Saudi Hajj authorities have been working to boost its capacity to cope with the steadily rising number of pilgrims.

To maintain security, more than 100,000 police and security force members are on duty in the Mecca and Medina areas.

But the numbers of this year's Hajj pilgrims has dwindled compare to previous years.

The downturn is due to fears of the spread of swine flu as pilgrims flooded into the kingdom from around the globe.

Four have already died from the (H1N1) virus, but on Tuesday the health ministry played down the swine flu risk to the Hajj.

The Saudi government has taken measures to provide medical facilities and personnel and installed equipment to screen pilgrims for signs of the illness.

20,000 medical staff also on stand-by to provide the pilgrims with health care.
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