Omantel restores 50% of Internet traffic in the Sultanate

An official source at Omantel said that the company has stepped up its efforts over the past two days to add four alternative lines for the Internet in the Sultanate to work alongside three other lines that were not affected. He indicated that the company has 16 Internet packages serving the information network, adding that 13 lines were affected during the last few days.

The source said that Omantel, in cooperation with several telecom companies in the region, has managed to provide these alternative lines in order to fix the problems in the network. He added that all other lines would return to normal on 25 December as the company would add three or four other lines to serve subscribers who were affected because of the cutoffs. He added that such a mishap is beyond Omantel control, noting that the all countries of the world suffered the same problem.

It is worth noting that cutoffs in three undersea cable north Italy last Friday have snarled Internet traffic all over the world especially in Europe, North Africa and Gulf countries.

International sources said that Flaj and CMW companies that manage the damaged cables "Flaj, CMW-3 and CMW-4" have already started cable repair works.

Internet and phone communications between Europe, the Middle East and Asia were badly affected after three undersea cables were damaged in the Mediterranean Sea. The French telecommunications company "France Telecom" said that the cutoff, which was located in the Mediterranean Sea between Sicily and Tunisia, was caused by an earthquake. It said that three cables linking the Middle East, Europe, and South East Asia were damaged and that these cables serve most Middle East countries, India and other countries. A ship was sent to the location to repair the cables, it added.