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A total of 592 Kosovans will perform hajj this year, including 130 women. |
PRISTINA — Short-term passports issued by the United Nations and abject poverty are forcing many Muslim Kosovans to put off or scrap their hajj plans every year, a senior Muslim leader in the Muslim-majority province said on Tuesday, December 4.
"Every year, between one and two hundred Kosovans cannot help but put off hajj plans because their UN-sanctioned passports are due to expire," Grand Imam at Kosovo's Islamic Sheikdom Sabri Bajgora told IslamOnline.net.
He said the world body is reluctant to make the travel documents renewable for more than two years.
"We have tried to convince UN officials to extend passport validity for ten or even five years, but to no avail," he said.
The Saudi Embassy in neighboring Albania conditions that passports of pilgrims must be valid for at least six months, said Bajogra.
"Many passports happen to expire shortly before hajj," due to this short-term passport validity, he said.
Kosovo has been administered by the UN since a 1999 NATO bombing campaign halted civilian killings and ethnic cleansing by Serbian troops.
A total of 592 Kosovans will perform hajj this year, including 130 women. Of this number, youths make up 35 percent, according to Bajogra whose association is the only body that organizes hajj trips in Kosovo.
One of the five pillars of Islam, hajj consists of several ceremonies, which are meant to symbolize the essential concepts of the Islamic faith, and to commemorate the trials of Prophet Abraham and his family.
Every able-bodied adult Muslim — who can financially afford the trip — must perform, at least once in their lifetime, hajj, which starts later this month.
Abject Poverty
Poverty is a further stumbling bloc to Kosovans yearning to embark on the holy journey, according to Bajogra.
"People in Kosovo live in abject poverty," he said.
Bajogra said the province's political instability has had its toll on the living standards and economic conditions of the Kosovans.
"We have towering unemployment rates, a serious shortage of foreign investments and it is almost impossible to get soft loans from international lending bodies until the political turmoil about the future status of Kosovo is settled; whether to stay as part of Serbia or declare independence," he noted.
The World Bank said last month that about 45 percent of Kosovans are living below the poverty line, basically due to political instability.
Kosovo is impatient for independence from Serbia more than eight years after the end of the province's 1998-1999 war.
Backed by the United States and some EU members, Kosovo Albanian leaders insist they will proclaim independence soon after a final report is delivered by an international troika trying to find a diplomatic solution to the standoff to the UN chief on December 10.
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