Iranian pilgrims that had traveled to Iraq for the Arba’een ceremony have been facing many difficulties returning to Iran.

Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli, the interior minister has promised that the traffic for returning pilgrims will subside by tomorrow, October 3rd.

He announced that over 1.6 million pilgrims have returned to the country. However, yesterday, the Iranian consulate in Karbala had reported of Iranian travelers being stranded in Najaf and Karbala. It was reported that many pilgrims have run out of money and don’t even have enough to return to Iran.

The interior minister says the reason for heavy traffic was that most pilgrims wanted to return through Mehran border, and we couldn’t force them to choose Shalamcheh or Chazabeh borders. He also stated that “the increase in the cost of transportation was due to the increase in the price of the dollar and its impact on the exchange rate between Iranian and Iraqi money.”

He continued: “Some people didn’t pay attention to the exchange rate and traveled with the same amount of money that they had last year. We told the consulate to help them so nobody is left stranded.

Almost two million people traveled to Iraq for the Arba’een ceremony this year.

Arba’een is a Shia ceremony of mourning.