AMMAN, Aug 23: An Iraqi Airways Boeing 737 made a test flight from Amman to Baghdad on Monday for the first time since the airline's planes were grounded in Jordan by UN sanctions in 1990, a company official told AFP.

The newly-purchased Boeing left Amman at 11:25am (1125am PST) with nine passengers and crew on board, technical manager and head of the Iraqi Airways agency in Jordan, Adnan al-Hadid, said.

"It was a test flight and the passengers were exclusively Iraqi Airways staff and crew," he said. Asked if the company planned regular scheduled flights from Amman to Baghdad in the near future, Adnan said: "Iraqi Airways will make arrangements in light of today's test flight. Maybe in a week or two."

Baghdad's international airport is being used as a military base by the US-led coalition forces and a high security jail for top officials of the ousted regime. Jordan's national carrier, Royal Jordanian, is the only airline that has been making commercial flights to Iraq but depends on clearance from coalition troops in Iraq for take off to and from Baghdad.

Six Iraqi Airways planes have been grounded in Jordan since UN sanctions were slapped on Iraq following its invasion of Kuwait in August 1990. Four are in Tunisia. On the eve of the invasion of Kuwait, the company paid European giant Airbus 10 million dollars for four planes, shipments that never arrived when sanctions stalled the deal. -AFP