Egyptian authorities today ordered the licenses of 16 travel companies to be revoked and their heads referred to prosecutors for “fraud”, accused of allowing pilgrims to travel without the required permission to Mecca for this year’s hajj, the annual pilgrimage of Muslims to Saudi Arabiawhich was marked by the death of hundreds of people due to the very high temperatures prevailing in Islam’s holiest site.

The Egyptian Prime Minister Mustafa Mandbuli “ordered the licenses of these businesses to be revoked, their managers to be referred to prosecutors and fined for the benefit of the families of the pilgrims who died because of their actions,” the prime minister’s office announced.

Cairo’s decision comes after hundreds of pilgrims died during this year’s hajj, which took place this summer in the region, where temperatures are among the highest on the planet: the mercury reached 51.8°C in Mecca, the holiest place of Islam. More than half of the people who traveled for the hajj were unregistered pilgrims, meaning they had not received permission to be on this year’s pilgrimage.

According to yesterday’s AFP tally, which was based on official announcements and diplomatic reports, more than 1,100 people died, more than half of whom came from Egypt.

Every year, tens of thousands of worshipers attempt to participate in the pilgrimage without obtaining the necessary permits, which are paid for and granted according to quotas, giving access mainly to air-conditioned facilities.

Yesterday, a senior Saudi official defended the Sunni kingdom’s handling of this year’s hajj – which officially ended on Wednesday. “The state did not fail, but there was a misjudgment on the part of the people who did not calculate the potential risks,” the official told AFP. “This happened in difficult weather conditions and very high temperatures,” he added.

In early June, Saudi Arabia announced that its forces had pushed back more than 300,000 unregistered pilgrims from Mecca, including 153,998 foreigners who entered the kingdom on tourist visas without obtaining permission from authorized, official channels.

However, it appears that a large number of pilgrims without permission managed to participate in the rituals that took place for days, in particularly difficult conditions.

The Hajj, one of the world’s largest religious gatherings, is one of the five pillars of Islam, and believers who are able must make the great pilgrimage at least once in their lifetime.

Hajj permits are allocated to countries according to a quota system.

“We can estimate the number of unregistered pilgrims at around 400,000,” the Saudi official said yesterday.

“Most of them are of the same nationality,” the official added, possibly referring to Egyptians. Arab diplomats told AFP earlier this week that Egypt had 658 dead, including 630 unregistered pilgrims.