IT minister confirms submarine cable cut disrupting Pakistan's internet

Federal IT Minister Shaza Fatima Khawaja confirmed on Monday that a submarine cable cut near Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, is causing nationwide internet disruptions, with assessments ongoing to determine the extent of the damage.

In a statement on Monday, the minister said that she was in contact with officials of the Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL) over the situation.

“It is correct that slow internet is affecting businesses,” the minister acknowledged, adding that assessments were underway to determine the extent of damage.

Her statement comes days after PTCL had said the cuts to submarine internet cables in Saudi waters may impact internet services in the country during peak hours.

The company said that disruption affected partial bandwidth capacity on two major undersea cable systems, SMW4 and IMEWE that connect Pakistan to global networks.

It further added that international partners were working on a priority to restore the damaged links, while local teams had arranged alternative bandwidth to mitigate the impact.

However, the IT minister said that international repair agencies had not yet given a time frame for the restoration of services.

“The nature of the cable damage is being reviewed,” she added.

It must be noted here that the outage was also felt across the Middle East, with users in the UAE and Gulf countries reporting slow connections following a cut in the Red Sea.

Experts say that ship anchors are responsible for almost 70% of such incidents. The Red Sea is considered a critical global telecommunications corridor where repairs are technically complex and often prolonged.

In March 2024, three cables were damaged in the same region, causing widespread disruption to internet and cloud services.