Iran Plans Entry of 20,000 Afghan Pilgrims for Arbaeen Ceremony
The Director General of Consular Affairs at Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced that for this year’s Arbaeen ceremony, permission has been granted for approximately 20,000 Afghan pilgrims to enter Iran from Afghanistan. The process to facilitate visa issuance and their entry is underway. According to him, the aim of these arrangements is to better manage the pilgrims’ presence and provide appropriate services throughout their journey.
Mojtaba Karimi, referring to the experience of holding the Arbaeen ceremony in Iraq, said that broad public participation plays a fundamental role in the success of this religious event. He added that in Iraq, the majority of services to pilgrims are provided by the people and popular service stations (mukab), and this model can be utilized to enhance pilgrimage-related services in Iran.
According to this Iranian official, one of the important issues ahead of Arbaeen is organizing the pilgrims entering from neighboring countries, especially Afghanistan and Pakistan. He suggested that part of the travel arrangements and organization should be handled through travel agencies to ensure more orderly management and planning of the pilgrims; a move aligned with pilgrimage tourism and health tourism frameworks.
Karimi also stated that the Embassy of the Islamic Republic of Iran in Afghanistan has begun necessary coordination actions for sending pilgrims and efforts are being made to speed up visa issuance to allow better planning for hosting them. He stressed that the success of this plan requires preparedness and coordination among officials in the Khorasan Razavi province.
Regarding Pakistani pilgrims, he said that some of them will enter Iran via direct flights. It is anticipated that some of these pilgrims, after participating in the Arbaeen ceremony in Iraq, will travel to the holy shrine of Imam Reza and attend the ceremonies of the last ten days of Safar in the city of Mashhad.
