A British Airways passenger aircraft passes in front of the moon as it makes it's landing approach towards Heathrow Airport in west London in this photograph taken on July 18, 2016. (REUTERS/Xinhua)

TEHRAN, Sep. 2 (Xinhua) -- The first British Airways (BA) passenger plane landed at Tehran's Imam Khomeini Airport on Friday morning after it suspended flights in October 2012, official IRNA news agency reported.

The Boeing 777, which departed from London's Heathrow Airport at 9:10 pm local time (2010 GMT), arrived in Tehran at 6:15 am local time (0145 GMT).

BA will operate six return flights per week between London and Tehran.

BA, which ran a three-flight-a-week service to Tehran up to four years ago and first flew into the Iranian capital in 1946, becomes the second European airline to resume flights into the country, after Air France brought an eight-year break to an end in April.

The resumption of BA flights Thursday follows the lifting of some sanctions against Iran in January after the International Atomic Energy Agency said the Iranian government had met its obligations as part of a nuclear deal with six world powers.