Since Saturday, Internet blockade has taken off in seven townships of Northern Rakhine State and Southern Chin State’s Paletwa Township according to the Ministry of Transport and Communications. However, after a year of no internet local residents say internet connections are still unavailable.
According to the officialls, all telecom operators including MPT, Telenor, Ooredoo and Mytel have resumed mobile internet services for the area as of Saturday. The MPT chief engineer U Myo Swe said, “There are two parts regarding this. The connection is largely 2G in smaller towns and there are also subversive acts being carried out by using the mobile network. So, we adjusted the connection because of this so that mobile data service can’t be used. It is 2G but still you could do a lot with it back in 2013, 2014.”
Earlier in June 2019, the Myanmar government-imposed ban in Ponnagyun, Rathedaung, Mrauk-U, Kyauktaw, Minbya, Myebon, Maungdaw, Buthidaung townships and Paletwa in Chin state as the government believe Arakan Army (AA) has used mobile internet technologies to remotely detonate landmines and improvised explosive devices and to abduct and attack government personnel.
2G Internet connection is comparatively much slower than the outdated communication through dialup.
