TEHRAN – Escalating tensions between the two country’s representing Sunni and Shiite Islam, Iran announced on Sunday, May 29, that it will not attend this year’s annual hajj, accusing its rival of failing to guarantee the safety of pilgrims.

“Due to ongoing sabotage by the Saudi government, it is hereby announced that … Iran’s pilgrims have been denied the privilege to attend the hajj this year, and responsibility for this rests with the government of Saudi Arabia,” Iran’s Hajj and Pilgrimage Organization said in a statement carried by state media and cited by Reuters.

Iran and Saudi Arabia are bitter rivals, seeing themselves as the leaders of Shiite and Sunni Islam respectively.

Officials from both countries have tried to negotiate arrangements for Iranians to perform the Hajj this year, but without success.

Tensions escalated after hundreds of Iranians died in a crush in last year’s hajj and after Riyadh broke diplomatic ties when its Tehran embassy was stormed in January over the Saudi execution of a Shiite scholar.

Iranian Culture Minister Ali Jannati said the issue of ensuring the safety of the pilgrims was paramount for Tehran following the death of hundreds of Iranian pilgrims last year.

“The Saudi government deliberately acted in a way to prevent Iranian pilgrims from … attending hajj this year,” Jannati told Iran state television.

Millions of Muslims from around the world pour into Makkah every year to perform hajj, one of the five pillars of Islam.

If the Iranian ban is enforced, the annual Hajj in September will be the first in 30 years without any pilgrims from Iran, the largest Shiite Muslim nation.

Divisions

Saudi Arabia on Sunday denounced as “unacceptable” Iranian demands over its pilgrims joining the annual Islamic hajj this year, after Tehran accused Riyadh of raising obstacles.

“Iran has demanded the right to organize… demonstrations and to have privileges… that would cause chaos during the hajj. This is unacceptable,” Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir said in a joint press briefing with his British counterpart Philip Hammond, Agence France Presse (AFP) reported.

Jubeir said Saudi Arabia annually signs a hajj memorandum of understanding with more than 70 countries “to guarantee the security and safety of pilgrims”.

“This year, Iran refused to sign the memorandum,” he said, arguing that Riyadh has agreed to facilitate the travel arrangements of Iranian pilgrims despite having no diplomatic ties or air links.

“It is very negative if Iran’s intention from the start was to manoeuvre and find excuses, in order to prevent its citizens from performing the hajj,” he said.

“If it is about measures and procedures, I think we have done more than our duty to meet those needs, but it is the Iranians who have rejected things,” he added.

The Saudi hajj ministry said it had offered “many solutions” to meet a string of demands made by the Iranians in two days of talks.