President Sadyr Japarov of Kyrgyzstan has signed a decree introducing a temporary state monopoly on the supply and provision of international internet traffic. The order, which comes into effect on August 15, 2025 and remains valid for one year, hands exclusive control to ElCat, a telecommunications company nationalised four months ago.
Under the decree, all domestic telecom and internet service providers are required to transfer their agreements and international connectivity contracts to ElCat. Operators have been given a two-month window to complete the transition.
Although the government has not yet specified how the monopoly will be enforced or what mechanisms will be used, officials at the Ministry of Digital Development claim the policy aims to improve digital access, especially in remote or hard-to-reach areas.
Monopoly Move Follows Earlier Government Efforts
Plans to centralise international internet traffic first surfaced in late 2024. The cabinet initially proposed a bill granting Kyrgyztelecom exclusive rights to manage international data transit, citing national security concerns.
Kyrgyztelecom, more than 76% of which is owned by the Ministry of Digital Development and over 12% by the country’s Social Fund, defended the move as necessary to strengthen state control over critical infrastructure. The company emphasised that the proposed monopoly would only affect international data channels, not internal network traffic between operators.
Industry Responds with Legal and Economic Concerns
The Association of Telecom Operators (ATO) strongly criticised the proposal. In a published analysis, the association warned that forced state centralisation would inflict severe financial damage on the industry and violate existing laws, including the Constitution and the Competition Law.
According to the ATO, as of 2022 Kyrgyzstan had over 340 licensed telecom operators. A liberal policy framework had allowed these companies to independently manage international connections, encouraging competitive pricing and the development of alternative routes.
Kursiv also reports that Yandex Uzbekistan has announced the launch of an enhanced version of its search engine, Yandex Search, now equipped with neural networks trained specifically on the Uzbek language.
