Competition Commission of Pakistan, a in a ruling, said that LDI operators can withdraw themselves from International Clearing House agreement, and that commissions’ approval for any such agreement in future will be must, in addition to authorization obtained from any authority.

Idea of International Clearing House was first tabled in 2008 to prevent illegal telephony traffic landing into Pakistan. Primarily the purpose behind ICH was to make an arrangement through which all international traffic would land in Pakistan through one single gateway before it is distributed amongst the landing operators.

This way Government could keep a watch on the landing traffic, tariff, ASR collection and grey telephony.

However, LDI operators couldn’t reach consensus on the modalities of ICH operations. Especially the Transworld Associates Private Limited, being a competitor of PTCL, opposed the agreement and said that LDIs will become dependent on PTCL who will have unfair advantage in developing new international business and routes in future.

TWA moved the matter to CCP to examine its competitiveness, on which PTCL said that LDI operators have decided to shelf the ICH agreement and hence there’s no need for further proceedings on the case.

More details on ICH are available in CCP’s Ruling here (PDF File – 188 KB)