Internet Submarine Cable fault: Pakistan to have slow internet

Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL) informed on Saturday that Pakistan is experiencing slow internet as IMEWE, the international underwater cable responsible for bringing internet to Pakistan, has gone offline due to technical problems.

A spokesperson from PTCL claimed that a major flaw in IMEWE had occurred near Saudi Arabia. PTCL General Manager Imran Janjua said the fault has disrupted the country's entire internet infrastructure.

"In its absence, PTCL is working towards an alternative network to provide users reliable internet," PTCL's Chief Business Development Officer Sikandar Naqvi told DawnNews

A PTCL spokesperson also said that Jeddah has started making efforts to repair the cable, but added that "restoring the network will take some time."

Fallback system

The Asia-Africa-Europe- 1 (AAE-1) submarine internet cable was brought online in July. The 25,000-kilometre-long submarine cable system, which Pakistan is a part of, started operations on July 2. It will now be put to the test as the bulk of the country's network load will fall on it until the IMEWE cable is usable again.

Along with Pakistan, the AAE-1 cable system connects Vietnam, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, India, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Greece, Italy and France. It is the world's largest submarine cable system built in more than a decade.

It can provide the lowest latency express internet route among dozens of countries and regions across Asia and Europe, China Unicom, a key stakeholder in the project, had said in a statement.