Haj has never been so organized — from the trains that run on elevated tracks to the extremely helpful security forces on the ground and in the many helicopters that hover overhead informing the central operations command about possible bottlenecks. Saudi Arabia has poured billions of riyals into

JEDDAH: The newly expanded Jamrat bridge in Mina can accommodate 500,000 pilgrims per hour during the Haj season, said Prince Mansour bin Miteb, minister of municipal and rural affairs. “The streets leading to Jamrat, however, cannot hold these many pilgrims. As a result, only 300,000 pilgrims can

MAKKAH: As a child, Osama Al-Bar would walk from his home past Islam's holiest site, the Kaaba, to the market of spice and fabric merchants where his father owned a store. At that time, Makkah was so small, pilgrims could sit near the Kaaba and look out at the serene desert mountains where Prophet M

Dubai: A beard has cost a man a job worth Dh1,300 per month, almost four times he made as a baker back home in Pakistan. Jehangir Khan, 21, from Swabi district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, claims he was denied the kitchen helper’s job he was offered initially by an Italian restaurant after he refused

More than 1.4 million foreign pilgrims are expected to perform Haj this year, said Haj Minister Bandar Hajjar. “About 1.36 million pilgrims already arrived from different countries by Sunday night and we expect their number to cross the 1.4-million mark,” he said. Acting Health Minister Adel Fak

MADINAH: Haj convoys left Madinah for Makkah under the supervision of Madinah Gov. Prince Faisal bin Salman after Friday prayers. Government agencies have stepped up efforts to ensure efficient completion of procedures at arrival and departure points and to ensure that pilgrims are provided with co

Dubai: Imagine that you have been tasked with coming up with names for more than 22,000 streets in Dubai. Yes, that’s a big number and it includes highways, internal roads, side roads, flyovers and intersections. All of these, every one of them, has to be renamed. A gargantuan task to say the least.

Dubai: Sick of getting stuck in long queues to clear immigration at the airports? It’s time to heed authorities’ advice and use smart gates and e-gates wherever they have been installed. A Dubai Airports spokesperson told XPRESS that smart gates have become fully operational at the arrivals sec

INCHEON: - The Qatar women's basketball team forfeited a game at the Asian Games on Wednesday after being refused permission to wear the hijab, saying they were taking a stand against what they say is a discriminatory policy against Muslim women. The Qatari players were asked, in accordance with

Dubai: Tech-savvy shoppers are gearing up for an eight-day extravaganza of buzz, bargains and high energy when the main Gitex Shopper 2014 opens doors from September 27 to October 4 at the Dubai World Trade Centre. The event, bringing together the region’s power retailers and the world’s bigges

JEDDAH: More than 2 million pilgrims, who are to perform Haj this year, can use the newly expanded areas of the Grand Mosque in Makkah for prayers, Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah has ordered. In accordance with the royal directives, pilgrims will be able to perform prayers inside

Arafat Day, when Hajis stand in prayer on the plains of Arafat near Makkah at the peak of the annual pilgrimage, will be on Friday, Oct. 3, with Eid Al-Adha the following day, the Supreme Court announced after several people saw the new Dul Hijjah crescent on Wednesday. More than 2 million pilgri

Dubai: Finding a home to rent in Dubai is one of the most important decisions you will make as an expatriate in the UAE. It will affect your financial status for the whole year since rent here is paid in advance and takes a huge chunk out of your year’s pay. It will also impact your time spent on th

RIYADH: Today is a proud moment for all the people residing in Saudi Arabia, which is celebrating its 84th National Day, the anniversary of the glorious unification by great visionary King Abdul Aziz Al-Saud, the founder of the modern Kingdom in 1932. Declared as a national holiday, the occasion

Abu Dhabi: A positive response from bank customers to use their Emirates ID cards as ATM cards proves the UAE’s residents’ keenness to adopt latest technologies without any apprehension, a senior bank official told Gulf News on Sunday. Hundreds of customers of Al Hilal Bank have started using E

RIYADH: The limited number of labor visas for foreign workers owing to the Kingdom’s nationalization program has led construction companies to look for alternative solutions to deal with the acute shortage of skilled labor required for the completion of the massive projects still underway in several

Abu Dhabi: Motorists in the UAE can pay their traffic and parking fines issued in Abu Dhabi in instalments until November 30. The three-month grace period announced earlier to clear pending fines — from June 1 to August 31 — has now been extended by three more months, according to a press relea

Abu Dhabi: Etisalat has launched affordable tablet post-paid data bundles that offer customers flexible purchase options and ease of payment on a 12-month and 24-month contract basis. For as low as Dh150 per month, post-paid customers can get a free tablet with a minimum 1GB data. Cust