British Airways take off to Tehran in July

British Airways is to resume direct flights from London to Iran after nuclear sanctions imposed on Tehran were lifted last month.

The carrier will relaunch six direct weekly flights from Heathrow Terminal 5 to Tehran starting from 14 July. This will increase to daily flights in the near future.

Passengers will be able to book their flights from 3 February.

The starting price for return fares will be £384 for economy class, £728 for Economy Plus, £2163 for Business and £3763 for First class.

BA is the only British airline offering direct services between London and Tehran.

Until now Iran Air has been the only national carrier offering direct flights between the two cities due to travel warnings, sanctions and poor relations.

However, the airline has only been able to fly a limited number of flights due to restrictions on its use of European airspace.


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Travellers between the two countries have typically flown indirectly usually via Istanbul.

BA suspended direct flights in October 2012 when many routes between Europe and Iran were stopped after Western powers imposed sanctions on Iran over its nuclear ambitions.

The airline first started flying to the Iranian capital in 1946.

Neil Cottrell, BA's head of network planning, said: "Iran is a large and growing economy and Tehran is a brilliant business city so we are incredibly excited to be adding another gateway to the Middle East for our customers."

Both Air France and Dutch flagship KLM have announced they are ready to resume flights to Iran, deputy head of Iran's civil aviation authority, Mohammad Khodakarami, said on Thursday.

BA officials had visited the Iranian capital on Tuesday to discuss resuming direct flights.

"We are very interested in flying to Tehran and we are hopeful that it will form part of British Airway's network in the very near future," said Willie Walsh, chief executive of the UK's national carrier, at the time.