Afghanistan's cellphone, internet services down, monitoring shows

The Taliban administration offers no immediate explanation

An Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan flag hangs over a street in Kabul, Afghanistan, Oct 19, 2021. REUTERS

Internet and mobile telephone services were down across Afghanistan on Tuesday, residents and monitoring services said, but the Taliban administration offered no immediate explanation.

In the past, the Taliban have voiced concern about online pornography, and authorities cut fibre-optic links to some provinces in recent weeks, with officials citing morality concerns.

Internet connectivity in Afghanistan was flatlining around the 1 percent mark, said NetBlocks, an international internet access monitoring organisation.

Connectivity was cut in phases on Monday, with the final stage affecting telephone services, which share infrastructure with the Internet, NetBlocks said in an email to Reuters.

Private channel Tolo News, which warned viewers of a disruption to its services, said authorities had set a one-week deadline for the shutdown of 3G and 4G internet services for cell phones, leaving only the older 2G standard active.

Cloudflare Radar, a global internet traffic monitor, said that Kabul, the capital, suffered the sharpest drop in internet connectivity, followed by the western city of Herat and Kandahar in the south.

Strictures ordered by the Taliban leadership, based in Kandahar, have grown increasingly hardline.

This month, authorities stopped women working for the United Nations from entering its offices. Earlier, women were banned from many lines of employment and girls from attending high school.

The Taliban have said they respect women's rights in line with their interpretation of Islamic law.

Women's rights activist Sanam Kabiri said the Taliban had already closed schools, universities, recreation, and sports facilities for women.

"The Taliban are using every tool at their disposal to suppress the people," Kabiri, who is based outside of Afghanistan, told journalists in a video posting.

"What else do these ignorant men of another century want from our oppressed people?"

Women faced with curbs on leaving their homes to work had turned to the internet for an economic lifeline that allowed some to work from home.

In recent weeks, however, the Taliban have engaged with US officials, especially regarding American citizens detained in Afghanistan, one of whom they released on Sunday.