Operational tomorrow or the next day, for the beginning of Ramadan. The dials measure 48 metres and stand on a tower of over 400 meters. "Scientific" claims for the global centrality of Mecca Meridian.

Mecca (AsiaNews / Agencies) - A giant clock in front of the Grand Mosque in Mecca is about to be inaugurated tomorrow or within the first week of Ramadan in the hope that the "Mecca time” will replace, at least for Muslims, reference to the Greenwich mean time.

The huge clock, visible from all four sides, has dials that measure 48 meters and rests on a tower of 400 meters. The building to which it belongs, the Abraj Al-Bait Project, will be the second tallest skyscraper in the world after the Burj Khalifa in Dubai and will be 600 meters high. The clock will be visible at a distance of up to 17 kilometres and was designed and built by a German company based in Dubai Premiere Composite Technologies. Each quadrant contains the word "Allah" and the symbol of the Saudi kingdom.

The complex comprises 3 000 hotel rooms and apartments overlooking the Grand Mosque, five floors of shopping, huge prayer halls and conference facilities.

It has three five-star hotels: The Fairmont, Raffles and Swiss Hotel

According to Mecca residents, because the sacred city is the centre of the world, the time of the city should be the global benchmark for all time. In 2008, during a conference in Doha, professors and Koranic scholars put forward many "scientific" arguments defending the claim that the Mecca meridian is the world’s central time zone.

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• Al-Bait
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• islam