MAKKAH: Hotels in Makkah have announced that they will give properties left behind by pilgrims to their own employees after keeping them for a year, Al-Sharq newspaper reported yesterday.

Chairman of the committee of hotels in the Makkah Chamber of Commerce and Industry Waleed Abu Sabaa said the lost items would be kept for a year and if nobody claimed them, they would be given to the employee who had found them.

“No hotel in the world addresses the consulates concerned about missing properties after the visitors have left,” he said. He, however, explained that it was not difficult to communicate with the pilgrims who came through Haj or Umrah companies.

Ahmad Al-Batli, a professor teaching Sunna at Imam Muhammad bin Saud Islamic University, contested the decision and said hotels had no right whatsoever to give to their employees items left behind by pilgrims. He cited the Prophet’s Hadith to the effect that no one should claim ownership to Makkah picks. “It is against Shariah to give the hotel employees items that were left behind by the pilgrims during their stay,” he said.