Iraqi Resistance Movement Vows to Stage Airport Sit-ins over Iran Aerial Blockade

By Staff, Agencies 

An Iraqi anti-terror resistance group has denounced the Baghdad government’s decision to halt Iranian airline operations following US sanctions on Iran’s aviation sector, vowing to stage sit-ins at Iraqi airports nationwide unless normal air traffic between the two Muslim neighboring countries resumes.

“We will not wait long,” Hezbollah Al-Nujaba Secretary General Sheikh Akram Al-Kaabi said in a statement on Friday.

He urged Iraqi political forces to “break free from American dominance.”

The restrictions, Al-Kaabi said, were preventing millions of people from visiting religious sites and harming Iraq’s economy.

On Thursday, the Kata'ib Hezbollah resistance group called upon all walks of Iraqi society to break “the US siege on Iran.”

The faction urged Iraqi citizens to “circumvent the embargo through all available means” in demonstration of solidarity with Iran, including the purchase of Iranian commodities, the facilitation of commercial relations with Iran, and the abstention from any undertakings that would exacerbate Iranians’ hardship.

The group also asked Shia religious authorities to issue a decree [fatwa] on whether it is religiously permissible “to help the enemy, in any form, besiege and starve the Iranian people.”

Iraq’s Kata’ib Hezbollah has strongly condemned US sanctions against Iran, describing them as a “dirty weapon” deployed after the failure of military options and calling for serious action to counter the ongoing campaign.

Commercial aviation services between Iraq and Iran were suspended after ground-handling companies stopped providing services on these routes over concerns about potential US sanctions.
The move prompted airlines to suspend their flights.

Najaf International Airport, the last Iraqi airport still operating flights to Iran, suspended the services at 2 am local time on Friday until further notice, according to an official directive.

Erbil International Airport and Sulaymaniyah’s International Airport took similar measures. Kirkuk International Airport also said it had no flights to Iran.

The disruption followed US measures targeting Iran’s aviation sector. On September 8, the US Treasury sanctioned 27 Iranian airlines and claimed that airports, fuel suppliers, ground-handling firms and other service providers dealing with sanctioned carriers could face secondary sanctions.