Over 1,000 Iraqis and Kurdistani citizens stranded in Tehran after US banned Iranian airlines
Mahan Air's Iraq and Kurdistan Region director tells Kurdistan 24 exclusively that over 300 are from the Kurdistan Region, many are ill or recovering from surgery and cannot travel by road or bus as the US aviation sanctions ground all Iranian carriers
ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) - More than 1,000 Iraqi and Kurdistan Region citizens are stranded in Tehran and unable to return home following the US Treasury's grounding of all Iranian airlines worldwide from September 23, 2026, Sarsang Mahmoud, Iraq and Kurdistan Region director of Iran's Mahan Air, told Kurdistan 24 exclusively on Saturday, September 26, 2026.
"We are receiving a very large number of contacts telling us that more than 1,000 Iraqi and Kurdistan Region citizens are stranded in Tehran and cannot return," Mahmoud told Kurdistan 24. "A large number of those people have had surgery or are ill and cannot travel by car or bus."
Mahmoud confirmed that more than 300 of those stranded are citizens of the Kurdistan Region, with the remainder being citizens of other Iraqi cities. The combination of illness, post-surgical recovery, and the physical impossibility of land travel for many of those affected makes the situation a humanitarian concern alongside its political and diplomatic dimensions.
The stranding of over 1,000 citizens is the most immediate and human consequence yet of Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent's September 22 announcement that all Iranian airlines would be shut down worldwide from September 23, with any entity providing fuel, landing services, or ticketing to Iranian aircraft threatened with exclusion from the US dollar system. The comprehensive nature of the shutdown, designed to deny Iranian carriers access to any airport infrastructure globally, has left passengers who were already in Iran with no available commercial air route back to Iraq or the Kurdistan Region.
Iraqi FM Fuad Hussein confirmed on Friday that Iraq is discussing the aviation sanctions with Washington and has formally notified Iran of the ban on Iranian aircraft at Iraqi airports. Iran's Supreme National Security Council said Saturday that it is negotiating with relevant countries to lift the airspace restrictions through civilian means and has ruled out military retaliation. Neither of those diplomatic tracks has yet produced a solution for the over 1,000 citizens who are stranded now.
The Kurdistan Region Government and the Iraqi federal government have not yet announced emergency measures to repatriate those stranded, and it remains unclear whether charter flights, land corridors, or diplomatic exemptions are being considered as immediate alternatives to the grounded commercial routes.