Tehran-Sulaimani flights to resume after 8-month suspension

Direct flights from Tehran to Sulaimani are to resume in the coming days, eight months after the Iraqi federal government imposed an international flight ban on airports in the Kurdistan Region in retaliation to the Sep. 25 independence referendum.

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Direct flights from Tehran to Sulaimani are to resume in the coming days, eight months after the Iraqi federal government imposed an international flight ban on airports in the Kurdistan Region in retaliation to the Sep. 25 independence referendum.

“The plan is to have flights between Sulaimani and Tehran resume on June 10, and according to the schedule, we will have two flights per week,” read a post by the Sulaimani International Airport on their official Facebook page.

According to the statement, privately-owned Iranian airline Mahan Air sent the flight plans to the Sulaimani airport.

“[Sulaimani] and Iran’s tourism companies have approved a permit to resume Tehran-[Sulaimani] flights,” Nazim Dabbagh, a representative of the Iraqi Kurdistan Region in Tehran, had announced on May 6. “The resumption of these flights requires some preparations that may take a week,” he had then explained. 

Flights between the Iranian capital and Erbil resumed on Apr 27, a welcomed decision for the people of Kurdistan who visit Iran for as tourists, for medical treatment, or to see family members.

Iran was one of the first neighboring countries to officially close its border crossings and air travel to the Kurdistan Region, shortly after the independence referendum.

Not all of the Kurdistan Region’s neighbors have resumed flights to Sulaimani however. After flights between Turkey and Erbil started anew in late March, Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim stated that no decision had yet been made to resume flights between Sulaimani and Turkey due to security concerns.

Editing by Nadia Riva