Saudi king rejects appeal for extra 1,000 pilgrims' visas?

MANILA, Philippines - King Abdullah bin Addulaziz Al Saud of Saudi Arabia did not act on the request of President Aquino for the issuance of 1,000 additional visas for Muslim pilgrims for Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia.

A source told The STAR yesterday that the Saudi embassy has yet to release the visas of the 1,000 Muslim pilgrims who are stranded in Metro Manila. All the pilgrims should have left the country yesterday.

Sultan Masideng Salic, National Commission on Muslim Filipinos (NCMF) bureau pilgrimage and endowment director, however, said they are still waiting for the embassy to process the additional visas.

“We hope and pray that the Saudi considers the request of President Aquino,” he said.

He also gave assurance that the NCMF will facilitate the return of the stranded pilgrims to their respective provinces if there will be no response from the Saudi King.

“The NCMF is extending financial assistance to the stranded pigrims,” he said.

The Saudi embassy, in an earlier statement, said it is taking into consideration the plight of the Filipino Muslims who went to Manila from far-flung communities in order to go on the pilgrimage, which is one of the five pillars of Islam.

The embassy said there is an annual meeting in Saudi between the Minister of Hajj and the NCMF, during which the commission requested only 4,000 hajj visas in addition to 100 visas for members of the Philippine Pilgrimage Mission accompanying the pilgrims.

According to the embassy, the NCMF had “all the chances to request any number of hajj visas,” for which a maximum of 12,000 was prescribed for the Philippines. The hajj operations in Saudi strictly regulate the inflow of pilgrims from all over the world, the embassy said, noting that its role is to issue visas on the basis of what has been agreed upon during the meeting.