Antitrust to check Rostelecom’s traffic tariffs in Russia’s north

MOSCOW, Jun 24 (PRIME) -- The Federal Antimonopoly Service will check whether state-controlled telecom giant Rostelecom imposed reasonable prices for the transfer of interoperator Internet traffic in Yakutsk, located in the north of Russia, which are much higher than in the rest of the country, the authority said late Tuesday in a statement.

“The signs of violations are in the creation of discriminatory conditions by application for connection operators of tariffs for services to connect data transfer networks and services to handle Internet traffic that did not allow connection operators to compete with Rostelecom on the retail market of Internet access services,” the statement read.

Rostelecom said it is ready to contest the decision at court. “The price for tariffs for services of connecting to data transfer networks and services for Internet traffic transfer in Yakutia is rooted in unique geographical and climatic features of the region,” the company’s spokesman Andrei Polyakov said.

“Yakutia is Russia’s largest region by area and the least populated one. The main part of long-haul connection lines lays on deep-frozen soil, swamps or unpopulated territories. The costs of exploiting one kilometer of networks in such conditions for the company are much higher than in other regions,” he said.

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