Iraq and Syria resume rail link

In a fresh sign of their improving relations, Iraq and Syria have agreed to resume rail links after a break of eighteen years.

The official Iraqi news agency quoted the head of Iraqi railways, Ghassan Abdelrazek al-Ani, as saying a weekly service between the northern city of Mosul and the Syrian city of Aleppo would start next week.

Mr al-Ani said the service would be expanded if there was enough demand, and could carry freight in the future.

The five-hundred-and-twenty kilometre-long service was suspended in 1982 after Damascus backed Iran in the Iran-Iraq war. Earlier this year, Iraq opened an interest section in Syria, the first diplomatic link between the two countries since 1982.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service