Afghanistan has plunged into a nationwide internet blackout, with the Taliban cutting off more than 43 million citizens from global communications as part of what it has described as “morality measures.”
Internet watchdog Netblocks said Monday in a post on X that multiple networks had been disconnected through the morning and that telephone services had also been impacted, resulting in what it said was a “total internet blackout.”
The blackout marks one of the most extensive and coordinated telecom shutdowns in Afghanistan since the Taliban returned to power in 2021, raising fears of further isolation of the Afghan people from the outside world.
The governor of northern Balkh province, Haji Zaid, said earlier this month that the Taliban’s supreme leader Mawlawi Haibatullah Akhundzada had ordered “a complete ban … on the fiber-optic cable.”
“This measure has been taken to prevent immoral activities, and an alternative system will be established within the country for essential needs,” he said in a statement, but did not clarify what was meant by “immoral activities.”
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