RIYADH (Dispatches) -- A Saudi minister held talks with an Iranian delegation about the possibility of Iranian pilgrims rejoining the annual Hajj despite ruptured ties between the two countries, state media reported late Thursday.
Iran and Saudi Arabia have had no diplomatic ties since early last year.
The kingdom's minister in charge of pilgrimages, Muhammad Bentin, discussed with the Iranians "arrangements concerning participation of the Iranian faithful in this year's hajj," the official Saudi Press Agency said.
It did not give more details but said the meeting took place Thursday in the Red Sea city of Jeddah.
SPA said the talks occurred in the context of meetings organized by the pilgrimage ministry with various countries about accommodation and other logistics for the Hajj, which will take place around early September.
For the first time in nearly three decades, Iran's 64,000 pilgrims did not attend last year's Hajj after the regional powers failed to agree on security and logistics.
But Saudi media reported in December that Bentin had invited Iran to discuss arrangements for this year's pilgrimage.
"Iran's policy is to send pilgrims to the Hajj (this year), of course, if Saudi Arabia accepts our conditions," Iran's Culture Minister Reza Salehi Amiri told state television Wednesday, when he confirmed Iran had sent a team to Saudi Arabia.
"In a letter I've written to the Saudi Hajj minister I have specified our conditions," he said.
"If they accept our conditions, we will definitely send pilgrims (this) year, otherwise the responsibility" will be on Saudi Arabia.
More than 1.8 million faithful took part in last year's Hajj. The pilgrimage is one of the pillars of Islam and all Muslims who can must perform it at least once in their lives.
Iran decided to stop sending pilgrims to Hajj over security concerns after two deadly incidents claimed the lives of more than 470 Iranian pilgrims during the 2015 Hajj rituals.
Days after the deadly human crush, which occurred in September 2015, Saudi Arabia published a death toll of 770 but refused to update it despite gradually surging fatality figures from individual countries whose nationals had been among the victims of the crush. Iran said about 4,700 people, including over 465 of its nationals, lost their lives in the incident.
Earlier that month, a massive construction crane had collapsed into Mecca’s Grand Mosque, killing more than 100 pilgrims, including 11 Iranians, and injuring over 200 others, among them 32 Iranian nationals.