The airport, which has not been operational since the group seized Mosul in 2014, will have a main terminal and VIP lounge.

Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani has inaugurated the northern city of Mosul’s newly restored airport, more than a decade after it was destroyed in a series of battles to dislodge the now vanquished ISIL (ISIS) group.

“The airport will serve as an additional link between Mosul and other Iraqi cities and regional destinations,” the prime minister’s media office said in a statement on Wednesday.

Al-Sudani’s flight landed at the airport, which is expected to become fully operational for domestic and international flights in two months. Wednesday’s ceremony was held nearly three years after then-Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi laid the foundation stone for the airport’s reconstruction.

Airport director Amar al-Bayati told the AFP news agency that the “airport is now ready for domestic and international flights.” He added that the airport previously offered international flights, mostly to Turkiye and Jordan.

In June 2014, ISIL seized Mosul, declaring its “caliphate” from Iraq’s second biggest city after capturing large swaths of Iraq and neighbouring Syria, imposing hardline rule over millions of people, displacing hundreds of thousands and slaughtering thousands more.

Nouri al-Maliki, who was the Iraqi prime minister at the time, declared a state of emergency and said the government would arm civilians who volunteered “to defend the homeland and defeat terrorism”.

At its peak, the group ruled over an area half the size of the United Kingdom and was notorious for its brutality. It beheaded civilians, massacred 1,700 captured Iraqi soldiers in a short period, and enslaved and raped thousands of women from the Yazidi community, one of Iraq’s oldest religious minorities.

A coalition of more than 80 countries led by the United States was formed to fight the group in September 2014. The alliance continues to carry out raids against the group’s hideouts in Syria and Iraq.

The war against the group officially ended in March 2019 when US-backed, Kurdish-led fighters of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) captured the eastern Syrian town of Baghouz, which was the last sliver of land ISIL controlled.

The group was also defeated in Iraq in July 2017 when Iraqi forces recaptured Mosul. ISIL then declared its defeat across the country at the end of that year. Three months later, the group suffered a major blow when the SDF took back the northern Syrian city of Raqqa, its de facto capital.

The airport, which was heavily damaged in the battle, has not been operational since the initial fall of Mosul.

It now includes a main terminal, a VIP lounge and an advanced radar surveillance system, al-Sudani’s office said, adding that it is expected to handle 630,000 passengers annually.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has yet to publicly respond to the 50-day ultimatum President Donald Trump issued him, though one top official on Tuesday suggested that Moscow “didn’t care.”

Deputy Chair of Russia’s security council and former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev took to X to express the Kremlin’s first reaction to the joint announcement by Trump and NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte that Putin has 50 days to end its war in Ukraine or face 100% tariffs. 

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“Trump issued a theatrical ultimatum to the Kremlin. The world shuddered, expecting the consequences,” Medvedev said. “Belligerent Europe was disappointed. 

“Russia didn’t care,” he added. 

Reactions to Trump’s latest frustration with Putin were mixed, as Rutte championed the move as “logical,” though top European Union officials suggested the move lacked teeth this far into the war. 

“On the one hand, it is very positive that President Trump is taking a strong stance on Russia. On the other hand, 50 days is a very long time if we see that they are killing innocent civilians, also every day,” the EU’s chief diplomat Kaja Kallas told reporters from Brussels when asked about the president’s announcement.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, left, and then Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev arrive to the Red Square Victory Day Parade on May 9, 2019 in Moscow. (Mikhail Svetlov/Getty Images)

“It is clear that we all need to put more pressure on Russia so that they would also want peace,” she added. “It is good that the Americans are making the steps, and I hope that they are also giving military aid like Europeans are giving.”

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Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko also questioned the effectiveness of the move and told German news outlet ARD that “I’m happy about the wave of support from the U.S.”

“But on the other hand, I do not understand why Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin is being given 50 days,” he added, according to a translation by Ukrainian media outlets, Kyiv Independent. 

“In 50 days, many more people could be killed in the capital and, throughout Ukraine, many more buildings could be damaged,” he said. “Therefore, why such a delay?”

Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko holds people away from a five-story residential building that partially collapsed after a shelling in Kyiv, Ukraine, on March 18, 2022. (Photo by SERGEI SUPINSKY/AFP via Getty Images)

Trump told reporters on Monday that he was frustrated by Putin’s lack of action when it came to stopping his war in Ukraine despite four separate occasions when the president thought a deal had been reached with the Kremlin chief.

“I speak to him a lot about getting this thing done, and I always hang up saying, ‘Well, that was a nice phone call,’ and then missiles are launched into Kyiv or some other city, and I’d say ‘strange,’” Trump said, recounting his conversations with Putin.

“And after that happens three or four times, you say, the talk doesn’t mean anything.”