Internet services in Egypt have been disrupted due to damage of undersea cables in the Mediterranean Sea, the Egyptian National Telecommunication Regulatory Authority said Friday.
Up to 80 percent of Internet services and call centers in Egypt have been cut after the submarine cables were damaged south of Italy on Friday for unknown reason, said the Egyptian MENA news agency.
The Egyptian side has contacted the international companies running the cables to give a repair report, MENA quoted an official source as saying, adding Internet services in Egypt is expected to improve in 12 hours.
Earlier in the day, Egyptian Minister of Communications and Information Technology Tareq Kamel ordered to set up an operation room to follow up the repair works, which are carried out by an international marine cable repair company.
Egypt is also trying to switch its Internet service to a backup route via southeast Asia and satellite.
Egypt is constructing another undersea cable, namely TE-North, to connect the northern Egyptian port city of Alexandria and the southeastern French city of Marseille, said MENA.
It is the second time in 2008 that Egypt witnessed a large scale Internet services cut due to submarine cable damage.
In January, Internet services and international calls were also partly cut in Egypt, along with a number of countries in the Middle East and south Asia.
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