TEHERAN - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is to perform the Haj in Saudi Arabia, the first time a president of the Islamic republic is to attend the annual Muslim pilgrimage, an official said on Thursday.Ahmadinejad’s senior advisor Mojtaba Samareh Hashemi said that the president would be taking part in the Haj after receiving an invitation from Saudi King Abdullah. “At the invitation of King Abdullah, President Ahmadinejad will take part in the Haj pilgrimage this year,” Samareh Hashemi told the semi-official Mehr news agency, without disclosing his travel dates.
Ahmadinejad’s media advisor Ali Akbar Javanfekr said on Wednesday the president had been invited to the annual pilgrimage to Islam’s holiest sites in Mecca and Medina, located in western Saudi Arabia. “It is the first time in the history of relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia that the king of this country invites a president of the Islamic republic to make the pilgrimage to Mecca,” Javanfekr said. “As a result, the visit of Ahmadinejad is considered to be an important event in the relations between the two countries,” he added. It will be Ahmadinejad’s third visit to the kingdom since taking office.