KABUL, Nov 2 (Pajhwok Afghan News): The Ministry of Communications has signed an agreement with a Chinese company on the establishment of a countrywide fibre optical cable network on Thursday.

The 3,300-kilometres long fibre optic cable will improve telephone, Internet, television and radio broadcast services in the country.

Communication Minister Amirzai Sangin, who signed the agreement with the ZTE Corporation, said the project would ensure cheap and better services for the countrymen.

The project is funded by the Communication Ministry with allocation of $64.5 million. The project will be completed in the coming two years.

The underground cable network would be extended from Kabul to Ghazni in the first phase. It would be spread to Kandahar in the south, Herat in west and Balkh in north of the country.

The minister described the extension of the cable network as the biggest and the best-quality service. The country would also be linked to its neighbours - Pakistan, Iran, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan - through the same cable network, said the minister.

The Chinese company ZTE has got the $64 million contract at a time when the Ministry of Finance accused the latter of evading tax and operating without getting license from the authorities concerned in the country.  

But Sangin said he was not aware of the tax evasion or any breach of the country's laws on part of the Chinese enterprise. The national exchequer had got $67 million from the telecom industry last year and expects the amount will jump to $90 million this year.

Zainab Mohammadi

by/dk