The Saudi Embassy on Monday said the recently introduced ‘Makkah Route Initiative’ provides pilgrims the best services through the completion of their entry into the Kingdom from the airports of their countries. It reduces the trouble of waiting on arrival at the Kingdom’s points to complete their entry procedures and receiving belongings.
The services include issuance of visas, customs and passport procedures,
facilitating health requirements, as well as sorting luggage according to transportation and housing arrangements in Saudi Arabia. These pre-departure services will not only ease the access of the pilgrims into the kingdom, but they will also allow them to head directly to their accommodations in Makkah and Madinah without having to deal with time-consuming procedures.
The number of countries that implement the ‘Makkah Route Initiative’ procedures at their airports has increased from Malaysia and Indonesia during the pilgrimage season 1439H to five countries in the 1440H season with the accession of Tunisia, Pakistan and Bangladesh, said the Embassy.
The number of pilgrims benefiting from the services of ‘Makkah Route Initiative’ has increased from 103 thousand pilgrims during the previous season 1439H to more than 225 thousand during this Hajj season 1440H.
‘Makkah Route Initiative’ is one of the initiatives being implemented within the National Transition 2020 programmes to achieve the ‘Vision 2030’ of the Kingdom to improve the quality of services provided to guests of Almighty Allah facilitating their performance (Manasik) and progress of shortening their time and efforts in a couple of countries.
The programme initiated by the Ministry of Interiors of the Kingdom being implemented with the cooperation of ministries like Foreign, Health, Hajj and Umrah, Customs, Civil Aviation Authorities and the National Information Centre.
This year’s Hajj flights will continue until August 5, according to Hajj Agencies Association of Bangladesh (Haab).
