21SEP

Iraq reopens Iranian border crossings in stages

1 min read

15:34UTC

Iraq's Security Media Cell published a phased reopening of the Iranian border crossings on Sunday 13 September, with passenger traffic resuming that morning and commercial traffic staggered through Thursday.

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ConflictDeveloping

Iraq's Security Media Cell published a phased reopening of the Iranian border crossings on Sunday 13 September 2026 ¹. Passenger traffic at al-Shaib and Shalamcheh resumed at 6am that day, Shalamcheh commercial traffic follows on Monday, Mandali on Tuesday and al-Shaib on Thursday ².

Shalamcheh, the crossing the Israel Defence Forces bombed on 5 April as a logistics corridor between Iranian supply lines and Iraqi territory , is the first to take freight again. The sequencing runs passengers before lorries at every crossing, which restores the movement Iraqi families notice within hours and the movement that carries cargo over four days.

The timetable also prices the closure. Baghdad shut the crossings after tracing the drone launch sites near them ³, and published a route back before the investigative council it appointed has reported anything. A closure with a published end date asks less of Tehran than one without, and it tells Iraqi traders precisely how long to wait.

Deep Analysis

In plain English

Iraq had shut three of its land crossings with Iran and stopped flights there after drones launched from Iraqi soil hit a Saudi oil pipeline. On Sunday 13 September, Iraq's Security Media Cell, the body that issues the government's security announcements, published a timetable for opening them again. People could cross at two of them from 6am that morning. Lorries take longer. Commercial traffic resumes at one crossing on Monday, another on Tuesday and the last on Thursday. So the disruption for ordinary travellers lasted hours, and for goods it lasts most of a week.

Deep Analysis

Root Causes

Baghdad shut the crossings before it knew what its investigators would find, and published a route back before they found it. That sequence tells traders the closure was a response to an accusation rather than to a piece of evidence.

The closure also ran against Iraq's own interest. The crossings carry Iranian goods into Iraqi markets and Iraqi pilgrims into Iran, so every day they stay shut is a day an Iraqi government pays for a launch it says it did not authorise.

Escalation

Down. A closure with a published end date asks less of Tehran than one without, and Baghdad set that date before the investigative council it appointed had reported anything.

What could happen next?

Meaning
Publishing a reopening timetable sets the outer cost of the closure at four days for freight and hours for passengers.
Consequence
Iraqi traders now have a date to plan around rather than an open-ended stoppage, which limits the losses on cargo already at the border.

Sources:Al Jazeera·Middle East Monitor

Mentions:Israel Defense Forces (IDF) →Iraq →Iran →al-Shalamcheh border crossing →Israel →Baghdad →Tehran →

First Reported In

Update #178 · Saudi bypass hit, and Riyadh holds fire

Al Jazeera· 13 Sept 2026

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Causes and effects

Caused by

Iraq shuts three Iranian crossings and the flights

The phased reopening undid the closures within three days.

Reported 13 Sept 2026

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This Event

Iraq reopens Iranian border crossings in stages

The published timetable sets the outer cost of Iraq's border closure at four days for freight and hours for passengers.

Led to

Iraq reopens its last Iran crossing

Iraq's 13 September published reopening schedule culminated in this week's completion.

Occurred 17 Sept 2026

Read story →

Different Perspectives

Shipping and insurance industry

UKMTO counted about 20 US-facilitated Hormuz transits a day to 11 September against only 6 visible on AIS, with traffic still around 90% below the 138-a-day pre-war baseline. War-risk underwriters cannot price hulls they cannot see, or resolve whether the tanker El Gaia hit a mine, as Iran claims, or a missile and drone, as CENTCOM says.

European refiners

European refiners, including Poland's Orlen, absorbed a roughly $26 gap between Dated Brent at $130.80 on 15 September and ICE Brent futures settling at $103.87 on 18 September, a spread that widened from $13.45 on 9 September rather than newly opening. Their futures hedges no longer cover what they now pay for physical barrels.

Saudi Arabia

Saudi Aramco zeroed European term customers' October allocations and rerouted roughly 60 million barrels to Asia through Ras Tanura and Sohar, using Red Sea and Gulf terminal capacity built years ago to cut Hormuz exposure. Riyadh reallocated existing supply rather than negotiating a shortfall with Europe.

Qatar

Qatar's energy minister Saad al-Kaabi told Bloomberg at the Qatar Economic Forum on 20 September that Bessent's two-year Hormuz-obsolescence forecast is wrong, and that Doha has deliberately built no bypass pipeline. Qatar's gas exports run through one waterway by choice, not oversight.

Iran (foreign ministry and Majlis)

Iran's foreign ministry and 130 Majlis deputies moved toward NPT withdrawal this week, with lawmaker Hossein-Ali Haji Deligani filing a triple-urgency bill on 20 September that Speaker Qalibaf has not yet scheduled. Tehran treats treaty membership as leverage still on the table, not yet spent.

Russia and China

Moscow and Beijing vetoed the Panel of Experts' renewal, maintaining Resolution 2231 lapsed in October 2025 and the 2025 snapback was never validly triggered, so the sanctions architecture the Panel enforces has no current legal standing. Both governments frame the veto as upholding law, not shielding Tehran.