Iraq dissolves national airline over decades-old financial dispute with Kuwait

Iraq dissolves Iraqi Airways over Kuwait dispute

BAGHDAD — Iraq’s government has dissolved state-owned Iraqi Airways because it is bankrupt from a decades-old financial dispute dating back to Saddam Hussein’s invasion of his oil-rich Gulf neighbor Kuwait, a Transportation Ministry spokesman said Wednesday.

Karim al-Tamimi said the airline ceased all operations on Tuesday, when the government made the decision to close it down. He said the government hopes to replace it with two or three other companies.

Kuwait has long demanded $1.2 billion in reparations from the airliner for alleged theft of 10 airplanes and millions of dollars worth of spare parts during the 1990 invasion.

“Iraq’s Cabinet decided to close Iraqi Airways and announced its bankruptcy because the company doesn’t own any airplanes and because of the Kuwaiti government’s cases raised against the company,” al-Tamimi told The Associated Press by telephone. “We hope in the future to replace it by two or three companies to resume its operations.”

On Tuesday, the airline said it had canceled routes to Britain and Sweden after Kuwait tried last month to confiscate the airliner’s first plane to fly to London in 20 years.

At the time, Iraqi Airways chief Kifah Jabar Hassan had his passport seized in Britain and was held for more than a week in connection with the Kuwaiti claims.

Hassan issued a statement Tuesday on the cancellation of routes in which he criticized Iraq’s government for failing to resolve the prolonged dispute with Kuwait.

Kuwait has repeatedly attempted to seize airplanes purchased by Iraq as compensation, as it did in 2008, when it secured a court order to take 10 planes ordered by Iraqi Airways from Canada’s Bombardier.