by 
At least 717 people have died and 863 more have been injured in a stampede during the hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia Thursday, the directorate of the country’s civil defense said.
Some 4,000 pilgrims were helping with the the response, and some 220 ambulances were dispatched to the scene, the directorate said. Pilgrims have been advised by officials to take alternative routes.
The directorate tweeted that the dead are of “different nationalities,” without providing further detail. And not that it was caused by people of African nationalities as been carried by some blogs.
Iran’s state news agency IRNA said at least 47 of the dead are Iranian, and all of them are men. The U.K. Foreign and Commonwealth Office said they were “urgently seeking” more information from Saudi authorities.
The stampede happened on Road 204 in Mina, located between camps for pilgrims outside the holy city of Mecca, Al Jazeera reported.
The stampede takes place nearly two weeks after a deadly crane collapse at Mecca’s Grand Mosque that killed at least 107 people and injured 238.