dvani

Georgia is looking into what Russian telecom company MTC is doing in the breakaway region South Ossetia. (Interpressnews.)

TBILISI, DFWatch–Georgia’s National Communications Commission (GNCC) has started monitoring of the radio frequency spectrum in order to learn the activity of MTC, a Russian mobile company.

The monitoring is done to find out what MTC is doing on the territory of Georgia, and in case violations are discovered, a commission will take measures as defined by law.

GNCC responded to a recent statement by Prime Minister Ivanishvili that Polish journalists told him they got connected to MTC, which informed them that they were in Russia whenever they were nearer than 200 meters to the so-called administrative border with South Ossetia.

GNCC recalled that in 2008-2010, two years after Russia-Georgia war, the company established sanctions on many Russian companies for illegal industrial activities inside the disputed region.

In a statement GNCC writes that it applied sanctions on the Russian mobile operator Megafon five times in 2008-2009, and issued a fine of one million lari (USD 600 000). Other companies Rassia, NTV, NTV+, TV-Center, were also fined several times.

GNCC sent detailed information about illegal actions by Russian companies in these disputed territories to the international telecommunications union ITU and GSM Association as well.

“Unfortunately, the activity of the Communications Commission did not lead to any reaction either on the local or international level,” the statement reads. “Despite this, GNCC welcomes the government’s interest in the illegal activities of the Russian private company on the occupied territories and is ready to cooperate to develop an effective mechanism to suspend illegal industrial activity on the occupied territories.”