By: OrePulse

Iraq's national shipping line, Iraqi Maritime Line, resumed scheduled container service in the Gulf, launching what Iraq's transport ministry described as the company's first regular operation in the region since the mid-1960s.

The state-owned carrier deployed the 902 TEU container ship Basrah on an eight-day shuttle connecting Jebel Ali, in the United Arab Emirates, with Umm Qasr, Iraq's principal container port, according to data from ship-tracking firm Alphaliner. The inaugural sailing was scheduled to depart Jebel Ali on October 20 and reach Umm Qasr two days later. Alphaliner is a container-shipping data and consultancy firm that tracks vessel deployments on routes worldwide.

The restart came as much of Iraq's container trade had shifted away from Gulf shipping routes since a crisis affecting commercial vessels in the Strait of Hormuz began in late February 2026. Significant volumes of cargo bound for Iraq moved instead through the Jordanian Red Sea port of Aqaba and then overland through the Trebil border crossing into western Iraq.

In the first seven months of 2026, Aqaba processed 37,182 containers in transit to Iraq, compared with 3,599 over the same period a year earlier, according to figures from the Jordan Shipping Association.

Global carriers including Maersk, CMA CGM and Hapag-Lloyd also arranged alternative routings for Iraqi containers through ports such as Aqaba, Mersin in Turkey, Jeddah in Saudi Arabia, Oman and the United Arab Emirates after the crisis began, adjusting schedules rather than relying solely on direct Gulf calls.

Vessels on the Jebel Ali-Umm Qasr shuttle still transit the Strait of Hormuz along their route. As a result, the new link adds to, rather than replaces, the alternative ports and overland corridors that have carried the bulk of Iraq's container trade in recent months.

Jebel Ali, Dubai's flagship port, ranks among the largest container hubs in the Middle East and functions as a major transshipment point for cargo moving to and from Iraq and other Gulf markets. Umm Qasr, located near Basra in southern Iraq, is the country's main maritime gateway for containerized imports and exports, handling the bulk of the country's seaborne trade outside the overland and alternative-port routings used since February.

A TEU, or twenty-foot equivalent unit, is the standard measure used across the shipping industry to count container capacity. Alphaliner's figures put the Basrah's capacity at 902 TEU, a relatively small vessel by current container-ship standards.

Iraqi Maritime Line's new shuttle gives Iraq a national-flag option on the Gulf route for the first time in decades, operating alongside the Aqaba-based and overland corridors that have carried Iraqi trade since the Strait of Hormuz crisis began in February. No further vessels or additional Gulf port calls were announced for the service beyond the initial Jebel Ali-Umm Qasr rotation.