Turkish carrier to resume flights to Baghdad as international airport restores 90% capacity

1 hour ago
Rudaw
A+ A-
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Turkey’s main carrier, Turkish Airlines, is set to resume flights to Baghdad International Airport on Thursday, the facility’s director stated on Monday, after several months of suspensions since the outbreak of the Iran war in late February.

“Turkish Airlines is expected to resume flights to Baghdad on May 14, after a suspension that lasted more than two months following the closure of Iraqi airspace in February,” Harith al-Obaidi said in a statement.

He further noted that “Baghdad International Airport has restored 90 percent of its operational capacity following the resumption of flights by Qatar Airways” on Sunday.

Earlier this month, Turkish Airlines announced it would “operate round-trip flights from Istanbul to Erbil International Airport starting May 8.” Days earlier, Turkish low-cost carrier Pegasus Airlines also confirmed the resumption of its flights to Erbil.

Turkish carriers, including Turkish Airlines, Pegasus, AnadoluJet, and SunExpress, suspended flights to Iraq and the Kurdistan Region in early March.

The suspension came just over a week after the United States and Israel launched a large-scale aerial campaign against Iran, triggering six weeks of hostilities before the two sides agreed to a Pakistan-mediated ceasefire on April 8.

Caught in the middle of the conflict, Iraq and the Kurdistan Region shut down their airspace in late February before reopening it around 40 days later in early April.

Comments

Rudaw moderates all comments submitted on our website. We welcome comments which are relevant to the article and encourage further discussion about the issues that matter to you. We also welcome constructive criticism about Rudaw.

To be approved for publication, however, your comments must meet our community guidelines.

We will not tolerate the following: profanity, threats, personal attacks, vulgarity, abuse (such as sexism, racism, homophobia or xenophobia), or commercial or personal promotion.

Comments that do not meet our guidelines will be rejected. Comments are not edited – they are either approved or rejected.

Post a comment

Required
Required