Flights to and from the Iraqi Kurdish region will be suspended from Friday evening. However, Turkish Airlines has announced its flights to Erbil and Sulaimaniya in the Kurdish region would continue for now, as any formal request was not delivered to the company yet from Iraqi authorities.
Meanwhile, a number of international carriers have announced they would halt flights to the Iraqi Kurdish region this week.
Low-cost carriers flydubai and Turkey’s Pegasus Airlines announced they will be temporarily suspending its flights to and from Erbil in the north of Iraq, complying with a notice from the Iraqi Civil Aviation Authority to suspend international flights.
Other large carriers in the UAE such as Etihad Airways and Emirates airline do not operate flights to Erbil. Air Arabia, the only other UAE-based budget carrier operating flights to Erbil, has not yet issued its statement on the matter.
Regionally, other carriers including EgyptAir and Royal Jordanian said they will also be suspending flights to Erbil.
Based on notifications received from the Iraqi Authorities to suspend operations of all international flights into Erbil and Sulaymaniyah, Qatar Airways will suspend operations to Erbil (EBL) and Sulaymaniyah (ISU) effective from 15:00 UTC 29th September 2017 until further notice.
