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Internet service fluctuation, Undersea cable damaged
Undersea cable faults hit internet service
Karachi, Dec 20: Internet service and call centre operations in the
country suffered fluctuation on Friday night after at least two of the four
undersea optic-fibre communications cables were damaged, officials
said.
They said initially a fault was reported in the Southeast
Asia-Middle East-Western Europe-3 (SEA-ME-WE-3) optic-fibre link near Alexandria
(Egypt). It was fixed within a 'few hours'.
"Later, we were informed that
the cable of our second undersea fibre link called SEA-ME-WE-4 had been
damaged," said Sikandar Naqi, Senior Executive Vice President, Corporate
Development and Special Projects, of Pakistan Telecommunication Company (PTCL),
the country's only internet backbone provider.
"The damaged cable is
1,800 nautical miles away from our seashore and an exact timeframe cannot be
given for its repair."
However, he said the country had four links from
different routes, the PTCL was relying on undersea fibre cable from Singapore
and there was no major complaint of service disruption.
The SEA-ME-WE-3
link has suffered second disruption in less than three months. In September, it
developed a fault near the same area of Alexandria.
In 2005, severe
damage to the country's only link had caused an internet blackout for a
week.
Officials of PTCL argued that now alternative solutions to the
problem were available and there was no ground to get concerned."We have the
capacity to cater for the overall demand of bandwidth in the country from any
link," said Mr Naqi. "Secondly, we don't see the problem staying for long. The
situation will become normal within the shortest possible time."
However,
members of the industry relying mainly on internet service complained that the
problem was more serious than it was in September because a majority of the call
centres were not getting the required level of bandwidth.
"Call centres
and software houses are facing serious problems," said Wahajus Sairaj, Convenor
of the ISPs Association of Pakistan (ISPAK).
"The alternative provided by
the PTCL has not met satisfactorily the needs of the corporate
users."
Agencies add: Internet service between Europe and the Middle East
was disrupted after three cables linking Egypt and Italy failed in the
Mediterranean Sea, according to a French company which manages the
cables.
The situation may not improve before Christmas and communications
may not return to normal until Dec 31, a spokesman for Reliance GlobalCom said.
"We know three cables have been cut. We still don't why or where. They cover all
the Middle East and India and other countries.
"We have no more
information. A ship has been sent to locate the place where the cables were
cut," the spokesman told reporters.
Egypt's state news agency MENA
reported that the cuts happened off the coast of Sicily at 0800
GMT.
Reliance GlobalCom directed a submarine cable repair company to head
to the region to fix the cables. Dawn
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S&T ministry received Rs535m during three years
Islamabad: The Ministry of Science and Technology received
foreign funds worth Rs535 million for the execution of some research-related
projects during the last three years.
This was stated in the National
Assembly in a written reply to a question on Friday.
To a question raised
by MNA Yasmeen Rehman, it was told that the Pakistan Science Foundation and
Pakistan Museum of Natural History, a subsidiary of the ministry, received Rs492
million in December 2005 for research projects in the field of natural science
applicable to agriculture for enhancement of crop production and food
security.
The Pakistan Museum of Natural History received $20,000 in 2006
for global biodiversity information facility, including training of the museum
team and organising national workshop on sharing biodiversity data.
The
amount was granted by US government under an agreement between the Economic
Affairs Division and Commodity Credit Corporation of USA.
The Pakistan
National Accreditation Council received Rs14.8 million from the NORAD, Norway
for capacity building and good governance.
The National Physical and
Standards Laboratory of Pakistan Council of Scientific and Industrial Research
received funds for installation of environment condition system.
Earlier,
Minister for Labour and Manpower Khurshid Shah in replying to a question told
the NA that the officials of the cabinet division tried to conceal the names of
the people to whom the LPG quota was allotted.
He said such actions were
tantamount to misguide the house, requesting the chair to defer the question to
seek comprehensive reply. App
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| Education News | | Updated: 23 May, 2012 |
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