Krymtelecom, disconnected from Ukraine, could be nationalized today
Moscow - Simferopol, February 11 (PolitNavigator, Mikhail Shtamm) – Yesterday's disconnection of Krymtelecom from Ukrtelecom will dramatically accelerate the nationalization of the former, Kommersant reports , citing the Crimean Ministry of Information. The issue could be considered by the Crimean State Council as early as today.
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The Ministry of Information and Communications of Crimea reported that two hours after the connection was cut off, employees of the state enterprise Krymtelecom and emergency services were working at all infrastructure communications facilities of Ukrtelecom. “To avoid provocations,” they were taken “under protection” by the Crimean People’s Militia, said the first deputy prime minister of the republic, Mikhail Sheremet.
By eight in the morning it was possible to restore city and long-distance landline communications on the peninsula. In the evening, it became possible to call emergency services from a mobile phone. Krymtelecom also restored Internet connections to almost all of Ukrtelecom's 70 thousand Internet users (the company was the market leader in broadband Internet access in Crimea with a 40% share). “It is a little more difficult with telephone communications with other constituent entities of the Russian Federation and with international communications, but it will take a day or two to restore it,” Dmitry Polonsky assured Kommersant. Communication will be established, according to him, using a fiber-optic line that Rostelecom ran to Crimea along the bottom of the Kerch Strait in April 2014.
Let us recall that, according to the Crimean authorities, Krymtelecom was disconnected yesterday from the unified communications system of Ukraine in Kiev. The Kiev office of SCM Rinat Akhmetov denies this and says that the physical disconnection of fiber-optic cables occurred on the territory of the peninsula.
A top manager of one of the Russian mobile operators says that it was possible to disconnect the network of the Crimean branch of Ukrtelecom both remotely from Kyiv and in Crimea. “It seems that Ukrtelecom has lost an asset in the region. It is not yet clear how this will be formalized legally,” he said. The cost of Ukrtelecom’s Crimean business is $20-30 million; if the company can receive at least part of the amount, it will be a success, the publication’s interlocutor concluded.
Crimea Telecom, which was cut off from Ukraine , could be nationalized today.