The airline, also known as Saudia, will depart from the Red Sea city of Jeddah barely two weeks after Saudi budget carrier flynas made the first commercial flight from Riyadh to Baghdad since 1990.

:: State-owned Saudi Arabian Airlines will launch its first flight to Baghdad in 27 years on Monday.

The airline, also known as Saudia, will depart from the Red Sea city of Jeddah barely two weeks after Saudi budget carrier flynas made the first commercial flight from Riyadh to Baghdad since 1990.

“Saudi Arabian Airlines will inaugurate regular flights between the kingdom and Iraq after an interruption of 27 years,” the official Saudi Press Agency reported on Sunday.

“The resumption of flights is in line with growing ties between the two brotherly countries.”

Flights between Iraq and Saudi Arabia were suspended in August 1990 after former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein ordered his troops into neighboring Kuwait.

After years of tense relations, ties between Sunni-ruled Saudi Arabia and Shiite-majority Iraq have begun looking up in recent months.