A group of Chinese Muslims who have been camping outside the Saudi Arabia embassy in Pakistan since August will be issued special visas to visit Mecca.

The Saudi Arabian Government will issue special one-off visas in an agreement reached with the Chinese government.

A spokesman for China's State Administration of Religious Affairs said both governments agreed to make special arrangements because of the circumstances, however it will be the last time the Saudi Arabian embassy in Pakistan will issue Chinese Muslims visas.

Under the Islam faith, the Umrah pilgrimage to Mecca is second to the main pilgrimage The Hajj.

Chinese Muslims can obtain visas for these visits from the Saudi Arabian embassy in China. However the Religious Affairs spokesman said a number of unscrupulous tour operators had misled Chinese Muslims.

"The Chinese government has always been helping Chinese Muslims pay their pilgrimages," the spokesman said.

"It offers as many conveniences as possible to Chinese Muslims in various aspects such as traffic, currency exchange and border exit and entry.

"Saudi Arabia welcomes Muslims all over the world to make the pilgrimages, yet that's only limited to those law-abiding Muslims and those who are damaging the Sino-Saudi relationship are not welcomed.

"Among the people who have followed the advice and returned to China, those who have not broken the law, will be arranged to take their pilgrimages this year."

The policy of Chinese government was to have the pilgrimages well organized, and to constantly improved the service offered to Chinese Muslims on their trips, he added.

Chinese pilgrimages to Mecca, organized by the Chinese Islamic Association, have been rising in recent years, he said.

China's "Regulations on Religious Affairs" stipulates that Chinese Muslims on a pilgrimage to Mecca should organize the trip through the Chinese Islamic Association. An agreement was made between the association and the Saudi Arabian Government in May on this, and Saudi Arabia has stopped issuing visas to individual Chinese Muslims since then.

However, the spokesman said that since August, a few people with ulterior motives have been exploiting some Chinese Muslims' misunderstanding of the agreement and their eagerness to pay for pilgrimages. These individuals have been organizing the Muslims to apply for visas at the Saudi Arabian embassy in Pakistan.

(China Daily October 4, 2006)