Cuba's Communication Crisis: Blackouts and Cellular Outages

On Wednesday, Cuba's state-run telecoms company, ETECSA, acknowledged a network flaw affecting voice and data services in select areas, although the full extent of the disruption remains undetermined. Through social media, the company assured customers it was diagnosing the issue but did not provide a timeline for restoration.

The outage coincides with relentless daily rolling blackouts that have nearly halted the economy in the Communist nation. Severe shortages of essential goods, such as food, fuel, and medicine, have compounded the situation, sparking a significant exodus to the United States since 2020. The blackouts, responsible for prolonged poor cellphone reception daily, complicate assessing the outage's scale.

Provinces, including Havana, reported recent service interruptions. In Matanzas, east of the capital, the Communist Party newspaper Giron highlighted cellular and data issues following a local power plant failure. It's uncertain if these outages are linked to the wider disruptions observed on Wednesday. Reuters confirmed widespread service limitations in Havana, with multiple residents experiencing connectivity issues.

(With inputs from agencies.)