Hajj may not take place due to coronavirus pandemic
Hajj may not take place due to the coronavirus pandemic, some pilgrims have already begun to cancel previously booked tours.
Muslim clergy in several regions recommend that believers transfer the Hajj to a more favorable period. But tour operators still hope that the Hajj campaign will take place in 2020 and are preparing to work with pilgrims on preventive measures, TASS reports.
In early March, Saudi authorities imposed restrictions on pilgrims arriving at a small Hajj, which, unlike a big Hajj, can be performed at any time of the year.
This year's big Hajj begins on July 29th. Annually about 900 people go on a pilgrimage from Bashkiria.
"People are warier; they keep asking if there will be a Hajj due to the spread of the coronavirus. Some pilgrims – very few of them - refused to go, took away the documents," the agency quotes Airat Yalaltdinov, the head of the Hajj department in Bashkortostan under the Central Spiritual Administration of Muslims of Russia.