By John Lee.
A dark fibre agreement has been signed between OFN, the international connectivity arm of Asiacell parent Ooredoo Group, and iQ Networks, an Iraqi fibre-optic infrastructure provider, to enable terrestrial transit connectivity across Iraq towards Türkiye and Europe.
According to Ooredoo Group, the agreement supports the overland component of a planned integrated connectivity route linking Asia, the Gulf, Iraq and Europe. It is intended to complement a separate landing arrangement between OFN and the Iraqi Telecommunications and Post Company (ITPC) for the Fibre in Gulf (FIG) subsea cable system, which is planned to land in Iraq.
FIG is described as the largest subsea cable system ever built in the GCC, with up to 720 Tbps of capacity across 24 fibre pairs, connecting Qatar, Oman, the UAE, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Iraq through a single high-capacity Gulf loop.
The agreement was signed at Ooredoo Group's headquarters in Doha. Those present included:
- Dr. Buraq Abdulkareem, Deputy Minister for Technical Affairs, Ministry of Communications
- Bassam Salim Hussein, Minister's Advisor for Technical Affairs, Ministry of Communications
- Ali Yaseen Dawood, Chief Executive Officer, ITPC
- Alaa Obais Hussein, Deputy CEO for Technical Affairs, ITPC
- Aziz Aluthman Fakhroo, Group CEO, Ooredoo Group
- Asoz Rashid, Group CEO, iQ Group
- Khalid Hassan Al-Hammadi, CEO, OFN
- Waseem Amjad, CEO, iQ Networks
- Zhino Qadi, General Counsel, iQ Networks
- Latif Can Ozel, International Sales & Business Development Director, iQ Networks
The combined infrastructure is intended to provide an additional geographical route for international data traffic, serving the connectivity needs of AI providers, hyperscalers, cloud providers, content companies, data centres and telecom operators. Implementation remains subject to regulatory and governmental approvals.
(Source: Ooredoo Group)
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