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ContainerSignal Daily: Iraqi line restarts Gulf container shuttle

By ContainerSignal Editorial · · 10 min read

Iraq’s national shipping line has returned to scheduled container services in the Gulf, deploying a 902 TEU ship on an eight-day shuttle between Jebel Ali and Umm Qasr while much Iraqi cargo still reaches the country overland through Jordan. The service restores a direct maritime link to Iraq’s main container gateway, but its vessels still transit the Strait of Hormuz. The past two days brought Suez Canal Authority readouts that put transit counts on the carriers’ return to the Red Sea, HMM’s signed newbuilding contract with HD Hyundai, and a January compliance deadline for new US filings on low-value imports.

Today’s Signals

Trade Routes

Iraqi line restarts a Jebel Ali shuttle. Iraqi Maritime Line is running the 902 TEU Basrah on an eight-day shuttle between Jebel Ali in Dubai and Umm Qasr, with the first sailing scheduled to leave Jebel Ali on 20 October and arrive two days later, Splash 24/7 reported, citing Alphaliner. Iraq’s transport ministry described it as the national carrier’s first regular Gulf operation since the mid-1960s. The service enters a market where overland alternatives have become a vital channel: Aqaba handled 37,182 Iraq-bound transit containers in the first seven months of 2026, against 3,599 in the same period of 2025, an increase of 933%, according to the Jordan Shipping Association. Maersk runs landbridge services from Aqaba into Iraq, CMA CGM routes southern Iraqi cargo through Aqaba and northern cargo through Mersin, and Hapag-Lloyd discharges at Khorfakkan for trucking to Sharjah or Jebel Ali and onward feeder carriage. The new shuttle complements those routes rather than replacing them, and Jebel Ali’s role as the relay point is the model explained in what transshipment means.

Suez readouts add transit counts. The Suez Canal Authority said Maersk chief operating officer Rabab Boulos expected all of the group’s shipping services to return to the canal by March 2027, and reported 276 Maersk-affiliated transits between January and September 2026 totalling 23.3 million net tons, against 146 transits and 7 million net tons in the same period of 2025, according to the authority. A day later the authority said Hapag-Lloyd’s regional head for southern Europe, Juan Pablo Richards, said further services were expected to return, with two Asia-Europe services already routing through Suez, the authority said. Neither readout named the services concerned or gave dates for individual changes. The counts put a number on a return that carriers and Freightos expect to be largely complete in the first quarter of 2027.

Arctic trial completes a round trip. The PanStar Acro returned to Busan on 11 October after a 50-day round voyage that began on 22 August and called at Felixstowe, Rotterdam and Gdansk, FreightWaves reported, citing Reuters and the Korea Herald. The ship reached Felixstowe in about 20 days and carried 737 loaded TEU against a planned 1,300 TEU, the report said. South Korea’s government backed the trial and plans to assess whether regular commercial services can start by 2030; President Lee Jae Myung said the voyage cut one-way sailing time by 10 days against the Suez route. Our October analysis of the Arctic container route covers why the return leg, not the eastbound run, remains the constraint.

Carrier Updates

Maersk and Hateco sign a Vietnam terminal MOU. APM Terminals signed a memorandum of understanding with Vietnamese conglomerate Hateco in Copenhagen on 20 October to develop a container terminal and rail freight network in northern Vietnam, with total investment estimated at up to US$3.5 billion, according to a Hateco statement, Bloomberg reported via gCaptain. The plan covers a rail freight terminal in Haiphong and three container facilities across northern provinces. Maersk and Hateco have already partnered on a US$400 million container port project in Haiphong, and Maersk is also involved in the Lien Chieu container terminal in Danang. The agreement is non-binding.

Fleet & Capacity

HMM signs its eight-ship order. HMM placed a newbuilding order with HD Hyundai for eight 13,000 TEU dual-fuel LNG containerships that HD Hyundai valued at US$1.42 billion, with deliveries starting in 2029 and deployment planned on HMM’s Far East to India to Mediterranean service, The Maritime Executive reported. Two ships will be built at HD Hyundai Heavy Industries in Ulsan and six at HD Hyundai Samho in Yeongam, and the vessels are 337 metres long. HMM also concluded the purchase of four feeder vessels, three of 2,800 TEU and one of 1,700 TEU. Alphaliner puts HMM’s operated fleet at 1.034 million TEU across 97 ships, 72 owned and 25 chartered, against a target of about 1.5 million TEU. The order lands in a delivery pipeline already at a post-2009 peak, and the size choice matters because the largest classes are limited by the ports and channels that can take them, as how container ships are sized explains.

Freight Rates

Freightos lanes rise as Jefferies claims a 130% gain. Freightos’s weekly update, published on 21 October, put Asia to North Europe at US$3,442 per FEU, up 6% week on week, and Asia to the Mediterranean at US$3,927 per FEU, up 3%, after months of declines on both lanes, Container News reported. Separately, Jefferies said global container freight rates had risen 130% since February 2026, from about US$2,000 to US$2,500 per container to about US$4,000 to US$4,500 in October, India Shipping News reported. The note does not identify an index, a trade lane or a container size, so the figure is a broker’s aggregate rather than an index reading and cannot be compared directly with a lane-level FBX or WCI value. The difference between provider scope and lane definition is what our explainer on container freight rate indexes sets out.

Regulation & Policy

CBP sets a January deadline for low-value postal imports. US Customs and Border Protection is requiring electronic filing at or before arrival for imports valued at US$2,500 or less, with a new entry type 13 for shipments arriving through the international postal network and continued type 11 processing for low-value cargo, The Loadstar reported. Type 13 entries must include the shipper or sender and a package tracking number that carriers must also put on the inbound manifest, and the compliance deadline has moved to 20 January 2027 from 22 October. Type 11 filings must be made electronically on or before arrival, replacing the current 15-day post-arrival window, and CBP wants the final deliver-to party listed where it differs from the consignee. CBP recorded about 52.4 million type 11 entries between 1 September 2025 and 31 May 2026 and 24.4 million postal entries. The changes follow the 2025 end of the US$800 de minimis exemption, which shifted low-value shipments into informal entry channels until a hard sunset on 1 July 2027.

What It Means

For shippers moving cargo to Iraq, the network is now a portfolio rather than a single route. The Jebel Ali shuttle is a direct sea option, but it still crosses Hormuz, and the Aqaba landbridge that grew 933% in seven months remains the fallback that keeps volumes moving when the strait is unsafe. Booking terms should show which leg carries the risk, because a quoted ocean rate covers neither the overland segment nor the additional days.

For carriers, the Suez readouts are the more consequential signal. A full return shortens round voyages and releases effective capacity that the Cape routing absorbed, and it arrives while Linerlytica puts the orderbook at 46.5% of the existing fleet, the highest ratio since 2009, as The Maritime Executive reported. Freightos makes the same point from the market side, saying the Red Sea return increases the overcapacity risk for carriers in 2027 if geopolitics allow its completion, in its weekly update. HMM’s order adds ships from 2029, so it changes the supply picture for the next contract cycle rather than this one.

For importers using postal or low-value channels, the CBP change is an operational deadline, not a tariff story. Electronic filing at arrival, sender and tracking data, and possible bonding requirements move work upstream to brokers and platforms, and the January date leaves little room for system changes over the year end.

Sources

Background reading

The explainers behind today's stories, if you want the fundamentals first.

Asia-Europe rates are riding a half-finished Suez return

Sixty-three percent of Far East to Europe capacity now uses Red Sea routings, but many loops still return via the Cape. That gap explains the rate rebound.

The Arctic container route works; the backhaul does not yet exist

Two Arctic container trials closed within days of each other. Both carried export cargo out and empties home, which is where the route's economics break.

Asia-Europe rates fall even as the container network stays tight

Asia-Europe spot rates fell for a twelfth week while intra-Asia set another record and mid-size tonnage ran scarce. The two readings measure different layers.

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