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Iraq's government has opened direct negotiations with Washington in a bid to secure exemptions for several of its airports from newly imposed United States restrictions on flights operated by or connected to Iranian airlines, according to officials in Baghdad.
The request follows the suspension of all Iranian flights at four Iraqi airports — Baghdad, Najaf, Erbil and Sulaimaniyah — on Friday, days after the US announced aviation sanctions targeting any company anywhere in the world that does business with Iranian carriers. The measures have effectively severed the air link between the two countries and left thousands of travellers with no option but to travel overland.
A statement from the media office of Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi said on Saturday that a US exemption covering Baghdad would allow services to restart on grounds the government describes as humanitarian, citing medical treatment, education, religious journeys and the interests of ordinary civilians. The prime minister's office said the exemption was being pursued precisely because of those categories of travel.
The same statement acknowledged the wider strain in the region, saying Baghdad was working to de-escalate tensions and warning that the continuation of crises "further complicates the situation." It called on all sides to favour dialogue and negotiation in order to bring the current crisis and conflicts to an end, framing that course as being in the interests of the region's countries and peoples.
The practical impact of the shutdown has been severe. With Iranian flights grounded in Baghdad, Najaf, Erbil and Sulaimaniyah, passengers travelling between Iraq and Iran are now facing road journeys of at least 12 hours. That burden falls hardest on the pilgrimage routes, which have traditionally been among the busiest in the region.
Iraq and Iran are both countries with Shia-majority populations, and the Najaf connection is particularly significant. Flights to and from the holy city carry large numbers of Iraqi Shia Muslim pilgrims heading to Iran's shrines, and equally large numbers of Iranians visiting sacred sites in Iraq — including Najaf and neighbouring Karbala. Cutting those routes affects ordinary worshippers rather than political traffic, and the timing has been widely criticised as insensitive to religious travel.
On Saturday, a large crowd of demonstrators gathered in Baghdad to oppose the suspensions, with the protest organised by Iran-aligned Iraqi militias. Later the same day, dozens of scholars and students from the Hawza of Najaf — widely described as the oldest and most influential Shia seminary in the world — held a vigil against the halt to Iranian flights, according to Shafaq News.
A statement read out by the seminary's Scholarly Assembly condemned the suspension, saying it had arrived at a moment when the peoples of the region "are most in need of strengthening the bonds of brotherhood" between them. The assembly urged the Iraqi government to "maintain the independence and sovereignty of Iraqi decision-making," signalling that religious institutions are worried about Baghdad being pushed around by outside powers.
Diplomatic channels, however, remain open. Iraq's ambassador to Tehran, Yasser al-Hajjaj, said the suspension of flights would be temporary and would do lasting damage to no one. Speaking to Iraq's state news agency, he said Baghdad had been in contact with Iranian authorities and was working to restore normal air traffic as soon as possible.
Al-Hajjaj argued that Iraqi-Iranian ties are "too deep to be affected by a temporary crisis." He pointed to the roughly 100,000 Iraqi students enrolled at Iranian institutions, an Iraqi expatriate community numbering in the hundreds of thousands, and thousands of crossings across the border every day as evidence of how deeply intertwined the two societies are.
Iran's ambassador to Iraq, Mohammad Kazem al-Sadegh, echoed that assessment, saying officials from the two countries are in contact and that a new decision on flights is likely to be announced soon, Iran's IRNA news agency reported. The mutual reassurance suggests neither Tehran nor Baghdad wants the disruption to become permanent.
Analysts see Iraq's predicament as structural rather than temporary. Al Jazeera's Jack Hewson, reporting from Baghdad, said Iraq is in a difficult position, allied to America while also bound to Iran, and at moments like this it is squeezed between the two. He noted that some Iraqis blame Iran for being overly controlling of their neighbour's affairs, while others hold the United States and Israel responsible for starting the war in the first place.
In either case, Hewson said, Iraq stays in a very delicate position between larger and more powerful states, and continues to absorb the economic consequences and the fallout. That economic strain is already visible: Iraq has been hit by falling oil revenues and rising prices as the conflict widens, adding pressure on a government that is simultaneously courting Washington and reassuring Tehran.
The aviation shutdown compounds those difficulties. Beyond the hardship of a 12-hour road trip for families, students and pilgrims, the halt disrupts trade and commerce, and hands Baghdad a new reason to demonstrate to both Washington and Tehran that it will not be treated as a peripheral player. For now, the outcome of the talks remains uncertain — but both governments appear to prefer a negotiated exemption over a prolonged severance.
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