Iranian airlines were barred from neighboring countries, including the UAE and Oman, on Thursday in response to new US sanctions, the first major impact of a shift in US policy to target companies in third countries that do business with Iran.
The General Civil Aviation Authority of the United Arab Emirates, the Middle East's biggest travel hub, said that as a result of the new US policy, it was suspending all flights by Iranian airlines until further notice.
Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-affiliated Tasnim news agency reported that flights had also been shut down to Oman, Georgia and Azerbaijan, and to the Iraqi capital Baghdad. It said authorities were working to reroute flights to another Iraqi airport in Najaf, a major Shi'ite Muslim pilgrimage site.
Washington had announced it would put sanctions on any global companies doing business with Iranian airlines after September 23, with the aim of grounding Iran's entire civil fleet worldwide.
Other countries in the Gulf region also appeared to have restricted flights.
Tehran's Imam Khomeini Airport listed scheduled arrivals and departures on Thursday to and from countries including Afghanistan, Armenia, China, Iraq, Pakistan, Tajikistan and Turkey. But no flights appeared to be listed to or from the nearby Gulf states, with which Iran has long had some of its most important business and travel ties.
Iran has suggested that enforcement of a US-mandated air blockade would lead to potential escalation. On Wednesday, a senior Iranian official threatened to make airports "unusable" in any regional country that abides by the US ban.
Houthis continue to fire ballistic missiles at Saudi Arabia
Separately on Thursday, authorities in Saudi Arabia said they had intercepted six ballistic missiles fired by Yemen's Houthi terrorists. The Houthis said they had fired dozens of missiles and drones at Saudi targets. An escalating conflict between Saudi Arabia and the Houthis has emerged this month as the combat zone in the wider Middle East war.
With the US-Israeli war against Iran largely stalemated for months on the battlefield, Washington has announced a shift in tactics to extend the reach of its financial sanctions by targeting companies from third countries that do business with Iranian firms, a practice known as "secondary sanctions."
Trump referred to the new strategy last month as "economic D-Day," comparing it to the assault on Nazi-controlled France in World War Two by the United States and its allies.
A flight ban, if sustained, could deepen Iran's isolation and worsen an economic crisis in the country, which is already facing a US blockade of its ports at sea.
"We are living in an open-air prison," a retired teacher in Tehran told Reuters by text message on condition her name not be used.