Air France to resume direct Paris-Tehran flights

Iranians celebrate the signing of the nuclear deal in July AFP

Air France has announced that it will resume direct flights to Tehran next year. The flights stopped in 2008.

The French national airline's Paris-Tehran flights will start again in April 2016, the company announced on Tuesday.

The move comes as trade links are reestablished between Iran and the West, following the 14 July agreement with the P5+1 group of big powers on Tehran's nuclear programme, which led to a major relaxing of sanctions against the Islamic republic.

Three flights a week will take off from Paris's Charles de Gaulle airport.

Air France wants to work with "a country with dynamic growth, the European Union being Iran's fourth-largest trading partner", a company statement said.