A private plane chartered by a humanitarian group left Paris for Baghdad Tuesday on the second such flight since an international embargo was imposed on Iraq in 1990, airport officials said.
The Falcon 900 jet carrying 12 passengers from a newly created association to help Iraqi children took off from Paris' Bourget airport at 0839 GMT and was expected in the Iraqi capital some five hours later.
Airport officials said the passengers, who include politicians from conservative and far-right parties and family members, are to meet Iraqi officials before returning to Paris on Wednesday.
The flight was likely to draw condemnation from the United States, which in September had denounced France for allowing a similar flight to Baghdad. Washington had argued that the flight violated UN sanctions.
The aircraft had left Paris after France ignored a UN sanctions committee request to delay the departure of what organizers insisted was a humanitarian flight.
It was the first commercial flight from France to Iraq since the Security Council imposed an air traffic embargo on Iraq on September 25, 1990 -- PARIS (AFP)
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