Iran Threatens Neighbors’ Airports as US Sanctions Disrupt Its Airlines

Iran threatens neighbors’ airports if they help Washington block its flights. As a U.S. deadline hit Wednesday, Iranian flights across the Middle East and Caucasus were suspended, but a Mahan Air jet still landed in China.

Iran threatened Wednesday to keep airports in neighboring countries from functioning if their governments help Washington block Iranian flights, as a U.S. wind-down period for aviation-related transactions expired and forced widespread flight cancellations.

Mohsen Rezaei, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, delivered the warning on state television the same day a U.S. Treasury grace period expired. That grace period had let companies wind down aviation dealings with Iran that Washington previously allowed.

Rezaei said Iran would make sure the airports of any neighboring country that helps the United States stop Iranian flights cannot function.

It was not clear how Iran intended to carry out the threat. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps had issued no public statement about any military mobilization against regional airports as of Wednesday.

The sanctions disrupted much of Iran’s international network on the first day but did not halt it entirely. At least one Iranian jet reached China after the deadline passed.

Why Iran is threatening its neighbors

Rather than relying on formal bans by foreign governments, Washington is trying to ground the carriers by going after the foreign companies they need to operate abroad. The Treasury Department has warned that businesses supporting sanctioned carriers, including those providing aircraft transfers, cargo services or general sales agent support, risk being sanctioned themselves.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent predicted in a CNBC interview Monday that the pressure would shut Iran’s airlines out of international flying.

Bessent said that on Sept. 23 “all the Iranian airlines will be shut down around the world.”

He spelled out what that means for foreign airports and service companies.

“If they land, you cannot provide them with fuel, you cannot provide them with landing services, you cannot sell them tickets or you will be knocked out of the dollar system,” Bessent said.

Airport services are largely paid for in dollars, including jet fuel, landing fees, ticket sales and ground handling. A handler or fuel supplier that services a sanctioned Iranian aircraft could be cut off from the U.S. banking system, whatever its own government’s policy toward Tehran. That puts companies in neighboring countries, the targets of Rezaei’s warning, under pressure to turn Iranian flights away.

Routes suspended across Middle East and Caucasus

Azerbaijan’s State Civil Aviation Agency said Iranian airlines’ flights had been suspended since Tuesday, and U.S.-sanctioned Iranian carriers stopped flying to Georgia on Monday, according to Georgian media. Majid Akhavan, spokesman for Iran’s Civil Aviation Organization, said Baghdad’s airport stopped accepting Iranian flights early Wednesday and the airport in Muscat, the capital of Oman, was not accepting Iranian passengers.

A travel agent in Tehran, speaking on condition of anonymity, told Agence France-Presse that flights to Qatar had also been suspended. The agent called the situation unstable and said the agency had stopped selling tickets for the time being for fear of cancellations.

Iraq’s government had not publicly announced plans to enforce a blanket ban on Iranian flights as of Wednesday, though several sources, including a senior government official, told AFP that Baghdad would comply with the U.S. measures.

Iran’s Tasnim news agency reported that Iranian aviation officials were in talks to reroute Baghdad flights to Najaf, and its correspondent there said Iranian flights to the city were operating normally Wednesday.

In Najaf, a holy city for Shiite Muslims, travel agent Haidar Shamaa said most travel companies in the city depend on booking flights to Iranian airports, according to Daily Sabah.

Foreign carriers have also pulled back. Turkish Airlines and its low-cost unit AJet list no Iran flights before March 2027, and budget carrier Pegasus has removed its Iran routes, according to a review of their booking systems. None of the three has attributed the changes to U.S. sanctions, and Turkish carriers first suspended Iran service in late February after U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran.

Iranian flights keep flying to China

Not every destination closed its doors. A Mahan Air flight from Tehran landed in Guangzhou, China, after the deadline passed, according to Flightradar24 tracking data.

Flightradar24 data showed Iranian departures to Shanghai, Bangkok and Phuket in Thailand, and Kabul in Afghanistan after the restrictions took effect. Some Istanbul flights remained scheduled while others were canceled, and flights to Najaf and Dubai were also on the schedule, according to AFP.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said Tuesday that China opposes unilateral sanctions that are illegal, lack a basis in international law and have not been authorized by the U.N. Security Council.

Separately, Iran routed an estimated $2 billion to $2.5 billion through a China-based trade mechanism over the past year, Iran International reported, citing Reuters. The mechanism used oil sale proceeds to generate credits for Chinese imports without sending money through international banking channels. It is not known whether the mechanism has any connection to Iranian flight operations in China.

How the US aviation sanctions work

The Treasury Department laid the groundwork for Wednesday’s deadline on Sept. 8, when it sanctioned 36 targets, including 27 Iranian airlines. The department accused Iran of using its aviation industry to transport weapons and personnel and to procure equipment through overseas intermediaries.

The Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control used two legal tools. It designated the 27 airlines under Executive Order 13902, which targets specific sectors of Iran’s economy. That followed an Aug. 24 determination that brought Iran’s aviation sector under the order.

It designated nine third-country intermediaries under Executive Order 13224, a counterterrorism authority. The nine were eight businesses and one individual located in the United Arab Emirates, Turkey, Britain, Malaysia and Kazakhstan. Treasury alleged that the intermediaries, acting as freight operators, front companies and general sales agents, helped Mahan Air with aircraft procurement and cargo services. According to Treasury, that help included acquiring at least three Boeing 777s during the summer.

“Let this be a warning to anyone doing business with Iran’s remaining airlines, all of which we sanctioned today: You are at risk of being cut off from the global financial system,” Bessent said Sept. 8.

The Sept. 8 action is part of a broader Treasury campaign the department calls Operation Economic Outcast.

License suspension closes a long-standing carve-out

Treasury also suspended three aviation-related authorizations, including permissions covering payments for overflights of Iranian airspace and flights into Iran by non-U.S. airlines using U.S.-origin or U.S.-controlled aircraft.

Chief among them was Iran General License J-1, which Treasury suspended indefinitely on Sept. 8. First issued in 2016, the license let non-U.S. persons temporarily re-export eligible civil fixed-wing aircraft to Iran. It covered qualifying U.S.-origin aircraft and foreign-built aircraft containing 10% or more U.S.-controlled content.

To avoid immediate disruption, the Office of Foreign Assets Control issued General License DD. It authorized only the transactions needed to wind down previously permitted activity and expired at 12:01 a.m. EDT Wednesday.

Jonathan Schanzer, executive director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington think tank, wrote in a Sept. 1 opinion piece with FDD intern Zev Mendelson that Operation Economic Outcast had a reasonable chance of success.