Iran Expands Access to Its Airspace for Intl. Overflights

Iran has expanded access for international overflights to its airspace days after a war with the Israeli regime ended as part of a ceasefire.

Transportation ministry authorities said on Saturday that only international transit flights would be able to pass through the skies over the central and western Iran, adding that airlines can also use the eastern half of the country’s airspace, which had already been opened to domestic and international flights.

Ministry spokesman Majid Akhavan said that airports in the north, south, and west of Iran, including Tehran’s Mehrabad and Imam Khomeini international airports, were not authorized to process flights.

Akhavan said that related authorities were still assessing flights to airports in other parts of Iran and the general situation of the country’s airspace. He later told the semi-official ILNA news agency that the main airport in Tabriz in northwestern Iran was the only airport damaged in Israeli attacks, adding that the facility would soon reopen after repair works on its runway.

The official said that major international airlines would resume their operations in Iran as soon as the country opens all parts of its airspace. Akhavan said that pilgrims remaining in Saudi Arabia since early June, when they finished performing their hajj rituals, are returning to Iran via a northeastern airport in the country’s second-largest city of Mashhad.

Airlines started to avoid the Iranian skies on June 13, when the Israeli regime launched an unprovoked aggression against the country. The Iranian airspace was partially opened on June 25, a day after the United States said it had brokered a ceasefire between Iran and the Israeli regime. - Press TV