BEIJING: Islamabad will greatly benefit in terms of security and revenue from the Pakistan-China optic fibre project, a source at the Chinese telecom firm Huawei has said.
The agreement to lay optic fibre between the two sides was signed during Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif official visit to China in early July and Huawei has been assigned the task in this regard.
In remarks published here yesterday, the Huawei official said that based on the requirements and plan in contract, the company will prepare a plan and implement it section wise. The optic fibre will be laid between Rawalpindi to Khunjerab, a distance of 820km.
The project will cost $44m and will be completed within of two years.
“From this project, Pakistan will get enormous benefits. At present, Pakistan’s international connectivity with the world is through undersea cables SEA-ME-WE 3 and 4 and IMEWE, and Pakistan is connected through spurs only,” the source said.
“This dependency is not only a risk but also entails security concerns. The voice/data and Internet traffic can be monitored and disturbed easily. To offset such a threat, through this project, a link will be created between Pakistan and Trans-Asia Europe cable in China, which would enable both Pakistan and China to have alternative routes for their international telecom traffic,” the official said.
Internews
