Slow Road to the Digital Age
by Sarah Parkes, ITU Telecom World 2003 On-Line News Service
Rebuilding communications in Afghanistan and Iraq

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Truth is the first casualty of war. Telecommunications is the second. In war-torn Afghanistan and Iraq, recent military interventions have left telecoms services in tatters, with key exchanges, satellite earth stations and microwave links knocked out within hours of hostilities commencing.

Some 18 months after the fall of the Taliban in Afghanistan, the situation is far from rosy, with patchy mobile service limited to a handful of cities and fixed line connectivity woeful at best. That said, slow but encouraging progress is being made, thanks largely to the tireless efforts of Minister Mohammad Masoom Stanekzai and assistance from development-oriented NGOs and financial institutions like the UN, the World Bank, the Islamic and Asian development banks, the Aga Khan Foundation and the ITU.

In Iraq, a crisis atmosphere still reigns, with ongoing political instability hampering attempts to rebuild even the most basic infrastructure. While many hope the recent announcement of three new GSM mobile licences will go some way toward alleviating that situation within the next two or three months, observers on the ground acknowledge many stumbling blocks still remain, ranging from the danger posed by unexploded ordnance to the deliberate sabotage of new communications facilities.

A senior US State Department spokesman confirmed that coalition-led attacks launched last March destroyed more than 50 percent of Baghdad exchanges, along with all intercity and international links. With average pre-war teledensity already well below a dismal 3 percent, it will be many years yet before Iraqis can hope to attain the levels of voice and Internet access enjoyed by their Middle Eastern neighbours.

In both nations, the sparse, chronically dilapidated state of pre-war fixed infrastructure means fast and effective deployment of wireless technologies like VSAT and mobile cellular will be key to restoring public telecoms access. After almost 25 years of conflict, Afghanistan’s Ministry of Communications (MoC) admits the country’s communications infrastructure needs to be rebuilt from the ground up, with aid totaling more than US$ 100 m required to meet this year’s build-out targets alone. Recent estimates put the number of functioning fixed connections in the capital Kabul at around one line for every 625 people, making the nation’s fixed network one of the weakest in the world, according to Afghanistan Reconstruction Trust Fund (ARTF) manager Philippe Dongier.

That’s not to say, however, that progress isn’t being made. Manoel di Almeida e Silva, spokesman for the office of the UN Special Representative of the Secretary General in Afghanistan, confirms work to rehabilitate international satellite links is already underway, with procurement for new microwave systems linking the capital with the eastern provinces and neighbouring Pakistan set to begin soon. In addition, a partnership between UNDP and Cisco Systems has seen eight new ICT training centers established in the capital, along with the country’s first Cisco Networking Academy at the University of Kabul. In terms of online access, Afghanistan’s new .af top-level Internet domain went live last March, and tiny handful of Internet cafés are now providing limited Internet connectivity to Kabul residents affluent and patient enough to use them.

Charles Kenny, senior infrastructure economist with the World Bank in Washington, says very tough working conditions are inevitably slowing down rebuilding efforts. “In many areas outside Kabul mine clearing has to be undertaken before equipment can even be installed. In the mobile sector, while service has been set up commendably quickly, public demand far outstrips capacity, which impacts on network reliability.”

The bank, which is acting as administrator of the ARTF, is playing a leading role in areas ranging from equipment repair to spectrum management and regulation. In addition to a recent pledge of an additional US$ 3 m to the MoC to improve international connectivity, it’s currently engaged in building a dedicated inter-governmental communications network linking seven ministries via VSAT and microwave, and is working to develop a new billing system for national operator Afghan Telecom.
For the moment, though, mobile cellular remains the backbone of virtually all national connectivity, with two GSM operators now providing services in Kabul, and regional cellular service available in major centers including Herat, Mazar-i-Sherif, Jalalabad and Kandahar over the Afghan Wireless Communication Company (AWCC) network, a joint venture between US-based Telephone Systems International (TSI) and the MoC, which holds a 20 percent stake.

Since interim Afghan leader Hamid Karzai inaugurated the network by making the country’s first-ever international GSM call in April 2002, AWCC has amassed more than 55,000 subscribers, and expects to add two more cities to the network before year end, according to spokesman Matthew Petrillo. Petrillo admits it’s often been an uphill struggle – with few roads, an almost complete absence of supporting infrastructure, no 24-hour power supply, ongoing security issues and spectrum in chronically short supply, just getting base stations installed and operational remains a major logistical headache.

To ensure service continuity, the company has become Afghanistan’s second-largest electricity generator and, in the absence of an effective banking and postal system, provides its service almost exclusively via pre-paid cards. While connectivity doesn’t come cheap, at around US$250-300 for a connection and US$130 for a SIM card, the service is a lifeline for businesses and communities struggling to get back on their feet after a generation of turmoil. The July launch of second operator Roshan, a three-way partnership between French giant Alcatel, the Aga Khan Fund for Economic Development and Monaco Telecom International, is expected to help push prices down while providing much a needed boost to capacity.

While not directly involved in infrastructure rebuilding, ITU has been playing its own valuable role in the country’s telecoms rehabilitation since December 2002, when it signed a two-year emergency support agreement with the MoC focusing on spectrum management and the establishment of policy and regulatory frameworks crucial for sectoral development. Emamgoli Behdad, senior ITU adviser for Asia and the Pacific based at ITU’s field office in Jakarta, is positive about advances so far, with a Master Frequency Plan now in place and training programs underway to redress the severe skills shortage resulting from two and half decades of war. Next on the agenda, he says, is a monitoring station to guard against interference to emergency wireless services and a handful of telekiosks to provide public ICT and postal services.

In Iraq, where hostilities continue to simmer and reliable lines are almost non-existent, the Ministry of Telecommunications last week announced the awarding of three two-year GSM licences to consortia comprising partnerships between prominent Iraqi businessmen and local Middle Eastern firms. The Atheer consortium, which includes majority Iraqi stakeholder Ali Shawkat’s Dijla Telecommunications Corporation and Kuwait’s MTC, will provide service in Afghanistan’s southern region, while the Asia Cell group comprising Iraq’s Farouq Mustafa Rasool and Kuwaiti firm Wataniya won the northern concession.

The centre will be handled by Egypt’s Orascom, an operator with a strong pan-African presence via interests in operators in 15 countries across the continent. Orascom Chairman Naguib Sawiris confirms that all concession-holders are committed to having service operational by the end of this year, and will be obliged to complete build-out in their own regions before being allowed to compete in other parts of the country.

The announcement came as a blow to US vendors, who had been lobbying hard for licences based on the US-favoured CDMA standard rather than GSM, which is used by most other countries around the world.

In the fixed network, US$ 45 m worth of contracts covering the restoration of satellite links, repairs to the 2,000km intercity fibre backbone, and restoration of Baghdad’s 12 key switching centers have been awarded to Globecom, Bechtel and Lucent, respectively. Few will envy their task. With many areas of the country still in a state of near-anarchy, senior State Department officials admit successful completion of these projects will only provide the very minimum capacity needed to support basic emergency communications. “There’s a very long way to go before we’ll have any functional public network in place,” one official admits.