MECCA, Saudi Arabia - The hajj season was a "great success" in every possible way, Saudi Interior Minister Prince Nayef bin Abdul Aziz said Wednesday, adding that the 251 people trampled to death during the stoning of the devil ritual "met their fate".
"I want to congratulate you on your great achievement ... all the security, safety and traffic plans were carried out according to the highest standards and those who say otherwise are ungrateful or hate this country," Prince Nayef told the men charged with the security of the annual pilgrimage to Mecca, the official Saudi Press Agency reported.
He said the mostly Asian pilgrims who perished Sunday as they pressed to throw stones at three pillars representing Satan in the valley of Mina near Mecca "met their fate because their place and time of death has been decided the moment they were born."
"We hope that their place in paradise with the faithful is assured because they have fulfilled their pilgrimage duties."
The once a year pilgrimage, or hajj, to Mecca is the duty of all Muslims with the physical and financial means and is not fulfilled without the high-risk stoning ritual. Many Muslims believe that those who die during the pilgrimage are martyrs.
But despite the fatalism, Nayef said some of the pilgrims who died in the tragedy were partly to blame for losing their cool.
"Our pilgrim brethren should have been, or we would have hoped that they would be, calm and moved slowly to respect those who fainted or fell to the ground dying and not to trample on them," said Nayef, who also heads the Supreme Hajj Council.
"I myself saw those who jumped over them (the fallen) and those who stood over a fallen human being to throw stones."
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