Egypt death toll from hajj disaster rises to 55

CAIRO — Egypt said yesterday that 55 of its citizens are among the more than 700 people who died in a crush of Muslim pilgrims during this year's hajj in Saudi Arabia.

Minister of Religious Endowments Mohammed Mokhtar Gomaa told the state-run Middle East News Agency that 120 Egyptian pilgrims are still missing and 26 are receiving treatment for injuries sustained during the disaster in the town of Mina, near the holy city of Mecca.

Saudi authorities say at least 769 people died when two large waves of pilgrims converged on a narrow road, in the deadliest event on the annual pilgrimage in a quarter-century. The hajj annually draws some 2 million pilgrims from 180 countries.

The largest number of casualties identified thus far is from Iran, which has accused Saudi Arabia of mismanaging the annual pilgrimage and vowed to take legal action against it. Shiite Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia are fiercely divided on a host of regional issues, and back opposite sides in the wars in Syria and Yemen.

Iran's hajj agency on yesterday said 155 Iranian pilgrims died in the Mina incident and another 103 were wounded. It said 321 Iranians are still missing.