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January 05, 2006
Mecca: Saudi Building Codes
A horrible illustration of what corruption does for you: a Haj hostel collapses killing at least dozens.
Now not that old buildings don't collapse from time to time, but corruption in KSA clearly is a reason for this (and the constant problems KSA has with the Hajj and fatal accidents tied to poor infrastructure, although to be fair to the Saudis - why escapes me at the moment - one has to acknowledge that many moujahiroun on Hajj have no clue as to how to behave in urban circumstances).
Which reminds me of the semi-amusing incident I witnessed last year during Hajj time when a bunch of doddy old rural mouhajirat from the Maghreb could not understand customs controls and kept trying to walk through random control points. The poor customs officer kept shouting at them, "This is the border, not a bus station!" Of course, I am not even sure they even understood Arabic.
Posted by The Lounsbury at January 5, 2006 06:25 PM
Filed Under: Gulf
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Comments
KSA?
can't say i bothered to think hard enough to read the article.
Posted by: drdougfir at January 5, 2006 09:03 PM
also, arty on the BBC about it for non-arabic readers who are even lazier than my barely-arabic illeterate self.
Posted by: drdougfir at January 5, 2006 09:06 PM
