MORE PROGRESS.

Baghdad International Airport opens for business on Tuesday.

EUROPEAN airlines are jostling to operate out of Baghdad International Airport, which is tentatively scheduled to reopen to commercial flights on Tuesday.

Airlines such as British Airways are already queuing for landing rights in the hope of cashing in on lucrative reconstruction-related travel in and out of the country. BA flew to Iraq until the first Gulf War broke out in 1990.

The deadline for applications to operate out of the airport, formerly known as Saddam International Airport, passed last Wednesday.

Interesting to note how the Europeans (British excepted) are clamoring to get rights to fly into an airport closed to them for over a decade...yet they wouldn't put up a platoon's worth of soldiers to make it happen.

I think the word is opportunism.