Sheikh Abdurahman Al-Sudais, head of the Presidency for the Affairs of the Two Holy Mosques, inspected on Friday the progress of the ongoing maintenance work at Maqam Ibrahim (the Station of Abraham), close to the Holy Kaaba. The Maqam Ibrahim refers to the stone on which the Prophet Ibrahim (peace be upon him) stood while he built the Kaaba along with his son Prophet Ismail. Sheikh Sudais gave instructions to finish the work before the advent of the holy month of Ramadan, which witnesses the peak annual Umrah season. More than 6.2 million Umrah visas have been issued since the beginning of the current Umrah season in October 2018. As of Thursday, a total of 5,703,775 pilgrims arrived in the Kingdom to perform Umrah. According to the weekly report issued by the Ministry of Haj and Umrah, 6,238,255 visas were issued to prospective pilgrims. The number of pilgrims who left the Kingdom after performing Umrah and visiting the Prophet's Mosque in Madinah reached 5,251,595. There are 452,180 Umrah pilgrims currently in the Kingdom — 318,423 in Makkah and 133,757 in Madinah, the Saudi Press Agency reported quoting the ministry. According to the figures, 5,090,542 of the pilgrims arrived by air via King Abdul Aziz International Airport in Jeddah and Prince Muhammad International Airport in Madinah. The ministry said 541,798 pilgrims arrived by land and 71,435 by sea. The largest number of 1,314,235 pilgrims came from Pakistan, followed by Indonesia and India with 849,864 and 559,122 pilgrims respectively. — SG
