The targets sit in the information and communication technologies section, on page 229 of the programme, which Presidential Decision 11934 approved on 27 October. The same table sets mobile broadband subscription density at 88.8, 94.0 and 96.0 per cent for the three years, and internet use among 16 to 74 year olds at 90.9, 92.3 and 94.0 per cent. The 2026 column is marked as an estimated outturn and the 2027 column as the programme.

The fibre path asks for 1.6 percentage points of gain in 2026 and 2.0 in 2027, or 3.6 over the two years, on a Corridor Signal calculation. The programme does not state the base for density. Dividing the 10,698,289 fibre subscriptions that the second-quarter market data report of the Information and Communication Technologies Authority (BTK) counts at the end of June by the 86,092,168 population the report cites gives 12.4 per cent, on a Corridor Signal calculation, which sits between the 2025 figure and the 2026 estimate.

206 infrastructure operators and 720,012 km of fibre

The programme's description of the sector says that 206 operators had been authorised for infrastructure operation as of June 2026, in order to build infrastructure-based competition. BTK's report gives the same 206 under notification-based authorisation and adds 14 under rights of use.

Those operators laid about 82 thousand km of fibre in the past year, the programme says, lifting total fibre length by 12.9 per cent to 720,012 km in the second quarter of 2026. BTK's series shows 637,668 km a year earlier, and says the total includes backbone and access routes that operators lease as well as own. The two documents agree on the figures.

They differ on 5G. The programme says 5G has been offered in all 81 provinces since 1 April 2026 and that the number of active 5G subscribers is close to 44.3 million; its figure of 102.2 million with machine-to-machine lines refers, on BTK's numbers, to total mobile subscribers. BTK's report gives 44,268,946 as its 5G real-user count, which excludes machine-to-machine lines, and 26,102,884 as its count of active 5G subscribers. The programme's number matches the first, though its label is the one BTK uses for the second, as the earlier report on the 44.5 million count set out.

The measures: software, cyber security and artificial intelligence

The programme's measure table for the sector, on pages 227 and 228, names a lead agency for each measure, marked (S), with partners beside it. The numbers refer to paragraphs of the Development Plan.

• Measure 579.2 backs wider use of standards in software and ICT services. The Ministry of Industry and Technology leads, with the Public Procurement Authority, the Turkish Standards Institution (TSE) and TÜBİTAK. It is to complete a Software Strategy and Action Plan.
• Measure 581.5 strengthens the national cyber security technical base. The Cyber Security Presidency leads, with TÜBİTAK, and the first listed activity is a needs analysis and project design for backing up critical public information systems.
• Measure 582.1 supports domestic cyber security products abroad. The Ministry of Industry and Technology leads, with the Ministry of Trade and the Cyber Security Presidency, on conformity assessment, testing and certification, and access to international markets.
• Measure 591.1 deepens cooperation on artificial intelligence. The Ministry of Industry and Technology leads, with KOSGEB, TÜBİTAK and the Turkish Exporters Assembly (TİM). Under the Pre-Competitive Collaboration Programme, a call for sector-specific Turkish large language models is to encourage adapting domestic models to industries.

The remaining measures, 592.1 to 592.8, concern audiovisual content and broadcasting. RTÜK, the broadcasting regulator, leads four of the five, including a new forum of broadcasting regulators from Turkic-speaking states (measure 592.6). In measure 592.7, RTÜK and BTK are to follow developments in broadcasting technology and prepare a sector analysis report. That is the only line in the table that names BTK.

The table lists no measure on fibre roll-out, spectrum or access pricing. The fibre target therefore stands without a stated delivery action in this section. The programme also records that Türkiye's first Cyber Security Board met on 5 May 2026 and that the 2026 to 2030 Türkiye Artificial Intelligence Action Plan was published on 18 August 2026.

Anadolu Agency, which reported the programme's publication, led with the macroeconomic frame: growth of 4.2 per cent forecast for 2027 and year-end inflation of 21 per cent targeted. Fibre work outside the programme runs on separate tracks, such as the northern Cyprus fibre protocol and the financing behind Türk Telekom's $1bn club loan.

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Nearly six months on, the release names no recipient country, no project and no first tranche. For corridor operators and ministries, what it changes is the size of a lender's stated appetite and the targets the lender has set itself, including a cut of about 40 per cent in connectivity costs in remote and landlocked areas.

What the US$20 billion is for

ADB expects to finance US$15 billion from its own resources and raise US$5 billion through cofinancing, the release says. The money is to go to terrestrial and subsea fibre networks, satellite links and regional data centres, with policy and regulatory support, including on cybersecurity risk management, and skills programmes for digital and AI readiness.

The targets for 2035 are first-time broadband for 200 million people and faster, more reliable connectivity for another 450 million. The release also promises 4 million jobs and the cost cut of about 40 per cent in remote and landlocked areas, without saying how the cut will be measured or against which baseline.

A Center for AI Innovation and Development in Seoul, backed by a US$20 million contribution from the Republic of Korea, is to train about 3 million people in digital and AI skills by 2035. "Energy and digital access will define the region's future," Masato Kanda, ADB's president, said in the release.

Where the corridor fits

The release names only Uzbekistan, as the place of issue, and Korea, as a funder. Central Asia enters through the power side: the US$50 billion Pan-Asia Power Grid Initiative builds on the CAREC Energy Strategy 2030 among other programmes, and targets about 20 GW of renewable energy integrated across borders and 22,000 circuit-kilometres of transmission lines by 2035. ADB expects to finance about half of that from its own resources, with up to US$10 million of technical assistance for regulatory alignment, common technical standards and feasibility studies.

For the digital side, the nearest ADB document is the GSMA study the bank published on 13 October, which placed Türkiye and Kazakhstan among the leaders of 34 developing Asian markets on the Mobile Connectivity Index and Tajikistan second from bottom, and urged cheaper spectrum and service-neutral licences, as Corridor Signal reported. The May release gives no ranking of its own.

Tajikistan has already set out what it wants from such a programme. Its Communication Service presented a draft Dushanbe Call to Action on resilient connectivity for landlocked developing countries at the ITU's regional forum on 29 and 30 September, listing lower-cost digital transit, financing for bankable projects and green data centres among six areas, as Corridor Signal reported. The ITU's draft outcome report put Partner2Connect pledges for the CIS region at US$2.29 billion, with progress reported on 28 per cent of them.

What an operator can and cannot take from it

An operator or a ministry can take three things from the release. First, the sectors: fibre, satellite and regional data centres are named, so a cross-border backbone or a landing station fits the stated scope where a national mobile network does not. Second, the ratio: three dollars of ADB money for every dollar of cofinancing on the digital side, a higher own-resource share than the roughly half the bank plans for the power grids. Third, the measure: the bank has set itself targets for first-time users and for the cost of connectivity in remote and landlocked areas, so a project that can show either has a case.

What they cannot take is a pipeline. The release gives no allocation by country or subregion, no application route and no date for a first project. The EBRD, whose telecom strategy for 2025 to 2029 says it will seek enhanced collaboration with ADB, particularly in Central Asia and the Caucasus, had by September disclosed one corridor backbone loan of its own, for Tajikistan, with a board date of 16 December, as Corridor Signal reported. Corridor Signal found no ADB project disclosed under the Digital Highway name by 26 October.

Dates to watch: 9 to 27 November 2026, the ITU Plenipotentiary Conference in Doha, where four corridor states are candidates for two Radio Regulations Board seats; and 16 December 2026, the EBRD board date for Tajikistan Rural Broadband.

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The seabed

Azerbaijan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Russia and Turkmenistan, the five littoral states, signed the Convention on the Legal Status of the Caspian Sea on 12 August 2018. Its Article 14 provides that they "may lay submarine cables and pipelines on the bed of the Caspian Sea", according to a University of Tehran paper that quotes the text, and law firm Norton Rose Fulbright read Article 14(3) as requiring agreement on a pipeline route only between the countries it crosses, in a note published in September 2018. Both documents describe the Convention as not yet in force when they were written. Corridor Signal could not obtain the official text, and the documents reviewed do not establish the Convention's status in 2026.

The Kazakh and Azerbaijani governments did sign an instrument on the day of the launch. During the ceremony on 15 October they exchanged a signed agreement on cooperation to develop the Trans-Caspian International Transport Corridor, according to the Kazakh presidency, which attributes construction of the line to Kazakhtelecom and AzerTelecom and does not say the cable was built under that agreement. The line was paid for from the operators' own funds, and their joint venture is responsible for building and operating it, according to the Kazakh government. None of the launch documents places the joint venture's prices or access terms under a regulator.

On each shore

Kazakhstan. Kazakhtelecom acts as the country's long-distance and international communications operator, with the right to settle accounts with foreign administrations under ITU regulations, according to the regulatory section of its 2024 annual report. It is included in the State Register of Natural Monopolies, and its antimonopoly regulation is overseen by the Committee for State Control in the Sphere of Communications, according to the report's competition section. The report records 2024 changes that brought maximum tariffs for leasing sites for communication equipment, and poles for fibre lines, under state regulation. It does not say whether international transit is among the services whose prices are regulated. Foreign networks have been admitted on stated conditions: Starlink committed in June 2025 to comply fully with national law on information security and communications, according to a ministry statement.

Azerbaijan. President Ilham Aliyev signed a decree establishing a Digital Connectivity information system, owned by the Ministry of Digital Development and Transport and operated by the Information and Communication Technologies Agency, to improve the efficiency, effectiveness and transparency of regulation and oversight in the sector, including telecommunications, Report.az reported on 15 October. The report gives no decree number, and the documents reviewed set out no terms for selling transit capacity.

Georgia. The transit leg west of the Caspian has the most active regulator. The Communications Commission has launched studies of two wholesale markets, "IP transit, i.e. global and local internet connectivity" and dedicated backhaul channels between settlements, as part of a holistic review of competition, according to a ComCom statement of 22 September. The same review found, on preliminary results, that one operator owns about 70 per cent of the potentially usable duct infrastructure, and experts recommended transparency, non-discrimination and stronger tools to regulate access fees. The statement gives no timetable for the transit study.

Türkiye. Where Türkiye has set terms on the corridor's edge, it has published them: the northern Cyprus fibre protocol writes maximum wholesale tariffs into its text, has the local regulator, BTHK, set the caps with regard to inflation and costs, and indexes them to consumer prices every six months, according to the Official Gazette.

What the series leaves open

Across five parts the documents establish a route, two coastal ends, an owner and a design capacity. They do not establish the landing stations, the backhaul west of Sumgayit, the lit capacity, the price or the regulator for the crossing. Three items would close the largest gaps: the Convention's status, ComCom's findings on IP transit, and any published terms from the joint venture. The Corridor Capacity Tracker will record them as they appear.

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Starlink Georgia was authorised to provide satellite internet services in July 2022 and began serving subscribers in the second half of 2023, according to the statement. Speeds offered to individual customers range from 100 to 150 Mbps, and services for legal entities offer up to 220 Mbps.

What was on the table

ComCom chairman Goga Gulordava and commissioner Ekaterine Imedadze met Dynamite Obinna, SpaceX's international policy lead for Europe and Africa, to discuss the company's "operating priorities and future plans in Georgia", the regulator said. The agenda covered high-speed connectivity, the resilience of critical infrastructure, the development of satellite internet capabilities and the Starlink for Good initiative, which the statement says aims to strengthen connectivity for local communities and schools.

ComCom said the new-generation terminals are expected to contribute to improved internet speeds and service quality. In its description of the service, the regulator notes that SpaceX has launched approximately 13,000 Starlink satellites in low Earth orbit and that Starlink provides connectivity including in areas where internet access is unreliable, limited or unavailable, according to the statement. The commission presents satellite broadband as one strand of its work on network resilience rather than as a substitute for fixed or mobile networks.

The statement does not say which technical standards would be updated, whether a rule change or a new authorisation would be needed for the new terminals, or when a decision might come. Officials from ComCom's competition and market regulation, spectrum and technology, international relations and legal departments attended, according to the release, which suggests the discussion touched on both market and spectrum questions.

On ComCom's own numbers, growth of about 200 subscribers a month implies roughly 2,400 additions over the year to June 2026, meaning close to half of Starlink's base in Georgia was added in that period. The regulator does not give a revenue figure for the company or say how many of the subscribers are businesses.

Huawei and 5G-Advanced

A month later, on 9 October, Mr Gulordava met Zhang Xiugui, president of Huawei Technologies for the Central Asia region. The meeting focused on mobile network development, "the use of radio frequency spectrum in Georgia" and next-generation mobile technologies, according to a ComCom statement. The two sides discussed the capabilities of 5G-Advanced, prospects for 6G and spectrum planning for mobile networks, and Huawei presented its technology vision, the statement says. It does not mention any agreement, band or timetable.

Three days earlier the commission held a working meeting with representatives of the US Embassy in Georgia and Shane Tews, president of Logan Circle Strategies and a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, on the role of communications and media regulators in the age of artificial intelligence, according to ComCom. That discussion covered AI governance, coordination between regulators responsible for telecoms, competition, data protection, consumer protection and cybersecurity, and the balance between investment and competition, the statement says.

Taken together, the three statements show the regulator engaging a satellite operator, a Chinese network vendor and US officials within a month. None records a regulatory decision. The SpaceX meeting is the only one that comes with operating data, and the commission has not published a consultation on the terminal standards it discussed.

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He was presenting the regulator's 2025 activity report. It took three auctions over three years to reach that point, after the regulator began work on 5G in 2020, the announcement of the third auction says. The record shows how one condition in the auction design, an obligation to give mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) wholesale access, shaped who bought spectrum and when.

The 5G record, step by step

Method: every row comes from one of four ComCom releases, dated 17 August 2023, 24 May 2025, 27 June 2025 and 22 September 2026, linked in the Source column. The bands and price of the 2024 auction are not given in the cited ComCom releases; they are discussed below from a press report and are not in the table.

What the MVNO condition did

In 2023 the commission required winners of all four combined lots to open their networks to MVNOs in return for additional discounts, its release on the first auction says. Magticom and Silknet raised concerns about the terms, and the commission agreed to offer one combined and two separate lots without that duty. The two operators, which the release says hold a combined share of more than 70 per cent of the Georgian telecom market, still declined to take part. Cellfie Mobile was the only bidder. It won combined lot N2, covering the 700 MHz and 3400-3600 MHz ranges, and accepted the MVNO obligation, which brought its fee down by 20 per cent to GEL 2,657,445. The release gave it one month to obtain a licence and pay 30 per cent of the fee.

After that auction the mandatory MVNO requirement was removed, the May 2025 announcement says, for two reasons. ComCom's holistic study of the sector had designated Magticom an operator with significant market power and imposed an MVNO access obligation on it, and Cellfie Mobile had already accepted the duty in 2023. By the third auction the condition was optional and worth a 20 per cent discount on the initial fee. Magticom was the only participant in the second auction in 2024. In the third, Silknet won combined lot N1 for GEL 48,802,257 and bought it without the MVNO duty, the commission's result notice shows. On the regulator's own account, two of the three operators now carry an MVNO access obligation, one through its licence and one through its market-power designation.

The third auction also limited who could bid for its nine separate lots to winners of at least one combined lot and companies already licensed for frequencies in the combined lots, the announcement says. The two combined lots were abstract lots, identical in bands, coverage obligations and price, which left the optional access duty as the main choice a bidder faced for them.

What the prices do and do not show

The headline sums are far apart. Cellfie's fee would have been about GEL 3.32 million before its discount, a Corridor Signal calculation from the 2023 release. Silknet's lot cost GEL 48,802,257, with 30 per cent due before the licence is issued and 70 per cent within a year, ComCom said. For the 2024 round, Georgia Today reported that Magticom obtained rights to the 700, 800 and 3410-3710 MHz bands for 15 years at a cost of GEL 77,125,735, also on a 30 per cent and 70 per cent schedule.

Those figures cannot be compared per megahertz. The ComCom releases name the frequency ranges in each combined lot but not the bandwidth assigned, and the packages differ by band and date. What the record does show is the sequence of entry: the operator outside the two largest came first, with an access duty, and the two largest followed only after the duty stopped being mandatory.

The coverage duties now set the timetable. Winners of the 2025 auction must gradually cover densely populated settlements, tourist areas, ports, airports, railway stations and main highways over seven years and build to European Union technical norms, the May 2025 announcement says, which places the end of that schedule in the early 2030s. The releases do not publish the interim milestones; the commission said the full terms were on its website.

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Access is for socially important projects. Advisers to regional governors on digital technology can also use the cluster, and startups qualify if they belong to the Digital Startups programme defined in a presidential resolution of 14 October 2024. The resolution entered into force on 21 October, the day the ministry announced the rules.

The resolution approves a regulation on free or preferential use of what it calls the ministry's artificial intelligence infrastructure: a high-performance computing cluster built on graphics processing units (GPUs) and a specialised big data database, provided through the state Centre for the Development of Artificial Intelligence and the Digital Economy, which operates under the ministry. Neither the resolution nor the ministry's release says how many GPUs the cluster has, of what type, or what the database contains.

What the regulation offers

• Language models: up to 10 million tokens per calendar month through an application programming interface (API), free for up to six months, counting tokens in requests and responses unless the Centre's technical conditions say otherwise. Up to 50 million further tokens are charged at tariffs the ministry approves, with a 50 per cent discount, and unused tokens do not carry over to later months.
• Use of language models is limited to inference, testing, validation, evaluation and preparing analytical information, so training a language model is not among the permitted uses.
• Other AI models: up to 120 GB of GPU video memory in total, for up to six months, for training, fine-tuning, testing, validation, evaluation and inference.
• Data from the big data database is free within the Centre's security requirements, but users may not pass it to third parties, copy, distribute or use it commercially unless the law or a contract provides otherwise.
• Each user may run one project at a time, and may enter a later round with a new project only after the usage period ends and the Centre accepts its final report.

Users may not use the infrastructure for cryptocurrency mining, malware, unauthorised access, spam, phishing or illegal content, and the Centre may warn them, restrict their access temporarily, or suspend or cancel it.

How projects are chosen

Preferential access goes to projects chosen in a contest held twice a year. Under the schedule annexed to the regulation, the Centre announces each round at the start of June and October, an expert commission scores the applications within 15 working days of the deadline, and the coordination commission for the Digital Uzbekistan 2030 strategy names the winners in July and November. Applications are scored out of 100: up to 20 points each for expected results and the efficient use of resources, and up to 10 each for social importance, efficiency, innovation, technical justification, security and data handling, and compliance with AI ethics rules. Projects must also comply with the ethics rules for AI-based solutions that the minister of digital technologies approved on 14 March 2026. Ties go to the applicant with more points for resource efficiency and expected results. Applicants may appeal within three working days to a commission of at least five specialists, which rules within five working days.

Prices and money still to come

The resolution gives the ministry two months to approve tariffs for the infrastructure, so the price of use beyond the free tier, and the base for the 50 per cent discount, had not been set when it was adopted. It also records that state bodies and companies receiving money from the Fund for Reconstruction and Development for AI projects, as interest-free credit under a presidential decree of 22 October 2025, must repay it in full to the Fund for the Development of Digital Technologies within five years of implementing their projects, under financing agreements with that fund and the Centre. It gives no amounts for those allocations.

The rules add a state route to computing capacity alongside projects Corridor Signal has reported, from a proposed regional computing network to Uztelecom's new data centres in Bukhara and Kokand. A day after announcing them, the ministry publicised a survey by IT Park Uzbekistan and the Khan Tengri Innovation Hub, run with Alibaba Cloud, of startups' need for AI tokens and cloud service credits; it gives no volumes or values.

The next dated step is the tariff decision, due within two months of 20 October. The schedule puts announcements at the start of June and October; the resolution took effect on 21 October, and neither it nor the ministry's release says when the first round will open.

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In between, on 5 October, Azerbaijan signed the charter of the Digital Cooperation Organization. None of the releases names a project, an amount or a timetable. Taken together they show the ministry looking to multilateral lenders and groupings as it works through its digital programme for 2026 to 2028.

Deputy Minister Rashad Hasanov met the World Bank Group's country manager for Azerbaijan to discuss cooperation in priority areas of the Action Plan for 2026 to 2028 on Accelerating Digital Development, the ministry said. The two sides exchanged views on possible World Bank support for digital transformation, AI-based infrastructure, data centres and the Government Cloud, and for training in cybersecurity and digital skills. Report.az, citing the ministry, lists the same areas and gives no figures.

The same action plan is cited by the ministry as the basis for its memorandum with SpaceXAI, signed on 1 October, which envisages piloting the company's Grok models in public services, it said in an earlier release. The ministry has also prepared a draft Cabinet resolution setting requirements for high-performance computing infrastructure, which is in coordination with other government bodies, it said in a release of 8 October.

At the 16 September meeting with members of the ADB board, Minister Rashad Nabiyev discussed the current state and prospects of cooperation, including upgrading, digitising and cutting emissions from railway, metro and wider transport infrastructure, the ministry said. The sides also discussed possible financing for air and maritime transport and for the space sector. The release does not name the board members or describe what space projects might be financed, and it gives no indication of whether any of the transport or space items are already in the bank's pipeline for Azerbaijan.

The ADB has its own connectivity agenda in the region. A study it published on 13 October, carried out by GSMA Intelligence, places Azerbaijan in the advanced group of the GSMA Mobile Connectivity Index for developing Asia, behind Türkiye and Kazakhstan, and calls on governments to assign spectrum at sustainable prices and simplify licensing, the report says.

Mr Nabiyev met Deemah AlYahya, secretary-general of the Digital Cooperation Organization, on 5 October and presented her with the organisation's charter signed by Azerbaijan as part of its membership, the ministry said. Their discussion covered digital transformation, artificial intelligence, innovation, cybersecurity, digital skills, joint initiatives, bringing Azerbaijani digital solutions to international markets, the start-up sector, transport digitalisation and regional connectivity.

The outreach comes as the ministry tracks the country's standing in international rankings. Azerbaijan rose nine places to 85th in the Global Innovation Index 2026, but Mr Hasanov called the ranking itself unsatisfactory given its 65th place on innovation inputs, a ministry release of 12 October says. The ADB study finds that Central and West Asia as a whole scores lowest on affordability and consumer readiness among the index's four enablers, according to the report.

The releases describe talks rather than commitments, and none of the three meetings is linked to a lender project document in the ministry's accounts. The ministry has not said whether it is seeking loans, grants or technical assistance for the data centre and Government Cloud work.

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The Spectrum Calendar lists the auctions, licence expiries and coverage deadlines in the corridor's mobile markets that can be dated from a document, with the document linked in every row. Where no document was found, the edition says so rather than estimating. This first edition reflects material available on 17 October 2026 and will be updated as dates move.

The Kazakh proposal, the calendar's newest item, would also offer spectrum in 10 MHz blocks that can be combined and set terms of 15 to 25 years for newly allocated frequencies, the report said, citing an agency release. The report gives no auction date. The proposal follows the 2022 auction, in which two 100 MHz lots sold for a combined 156 billion tenge against a starting price of 1.76 billion tenge each, the same report says. Both lots, at 3600 to 3700 MHz and 3700 to 3800 MHz, went to Kcell and Mobile Telecom-Service, at the time both Kazakhtelecom subsidiaries, Developing Telecoms reported in January 2023.

What the rows show

Türkiye has the longest horizon. Turkcell's half-year filing says the tender of 16 October 2025 moves operators from existing authorisations expiring on 30 April 2029 to an authorisation running until 31 December 2042, and puts Turkcell's own 5G licence at USD 1.2 billion excluding VAT, according to its Form 6-K. The tender allocated 400 MHz across the 700 MHz and 3.5 GHz bands in 11 packages for close to $3 billion, Mobile World Live reported.

Georgia and Armenia are now in their build-out windows. Georgia's winners must extend 5G coverage over seven years from the June 2025 auction, which points to 2032 for the end of the schedule, and Armenia's permits carry duties due within three to seven years of April 2025, or between 2028 and 2032. Both figures are Data Desk readings of the regulators' timetables; neither regulator publishes the interim milestones in the releases linked above. Georgia's releases also do not state a licence term. For the 2024 round, Georgia Today reported that Magticom obtained 15-year rights.

What the calendar does not yet show

For Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan, this edition found no published auction notice, award or licence expiry in the regulator and ministry documents reviewed, so those countries have no rows. For Kazakhstan, the terms of the 2022 licences and the date of any new auction are not in the documents reviewed, and the agency's proposal has been read through the press report because the release page could not be opened without JavaScript.

Method

A row enters the calendar only when a dated document supports it: a regulator's release, a filing or an ITU notice, with a press report used where no primary text was available and named as such. Dates are reproduced as published. Year ranges for coverage duties are Data Desk calculations from the start dates and periods stated by the regulators. The calendar is updated as dates move; readers can send documents to the Data Desk.

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Mr Koçyiğit described the rule at the 19th International Conference on Information Security and Cryptology, which BTK hosted, according to a BTK release. The release gives no number, date or text for the decision.

On 24 October the decision was not on BTK's list of published board decisions, where the most recent entries, published on 1 October, are a decision on maximum mobile prices and one revising a fixed broadband termination service, both dated 15 September. Neither the release nor Anadolu Agency's report of the speech, which also places the decision in September, says how a product qualifies under Türkiye's definition of a National Communications Product, how many sites are covered or when the rule takes effect.

Mr Koçyiğit presented the rule as part of a wider push. "Which device runs on our network is now also a matter of sovereignty," the release quotes him as saying (translated from Turkish). He recalled that the 5G licences require the share of locally made goods to rise in stages to 60 per cent and that of National Communications Products to 15 per cent, conditions Corridor Signal set out from Turkcell's annual report.

Security duties for every operator

At the same conference, Minister of Transport and Infrastructure Abdulkadir Uraloğlu said a board decision taken this year obliges all authorised operators, regardless of their economic size, to take additional security measures. The measure matches BTK decision 2026/DK-YED/71, dated 10 March in its text and listed as published on 24 March, which rewrote a 2014 board decision so that every operator BTK authorises must take the additional network and information security measures in the fourth chapter of the 2014 Network and Information Security Regulation, regardless of its annual net sales.

The same decision set the minimum paid-up capital for companies authorised by notification, with or without usage rights, at TL 10 million, and at TL 2.5 million for those applying to provide shared-use radio services. Operators already authorised in this way have until 31 December 2026 to send a sworn financial adviser's report showing that they meet the new floor, failing which all their authorisations are to be cancelled. The decision also raised the net-sales thresholds used in authorisation renewals and adequacy checks from TL 250,000 and TL 500,000 to TL 2 million and TL 4 million, and allowed operators authorised for satellite communications to serve other operators as well as their own subscribers, a change that bears on satellite broadband in Türkiye.

Disasters, motorways and rail

Drawing on the experience of the 6 February earthquakes, the 5G authorisation obliges operators to keep a communications capability that can reach a disaster area quickly, Mr Koçyiğit said on 20 October, and for emergencies operators must also keep ready, at the end of five years, 450 mobile base stations able to work over satellite links. At the Türkiye Century Summit on Transport and Infrastructure in Istanbul, he said the 5G authorisation also requires uninterrupted coverage of smart motorways and smart high-speed rail lines within one year of their opening, a second BTK release, dated 23 October, reports. Neither release says whether the 450 base stations are a total for the sector or a figure for each operator.

Mr Uraloğlu also said that where data is hosted, under which standards it is processed and who controls it are now strategic, economic and national questions. Ümit Önal, head of the Presidency's Cyber Security Directorate (Cumhurbaşkanlığı Siber Güvenlik Başkanı), told the conference that the Cyber Security Board had discussed data sovereignty as a separate item and that powers over artificial intelligence applications in the public sector had been brought under his directorate. Neither announced a rule on where data must be stored.

The next date in the documents is 31 December 2026, the deadline for authorised operators to meet the new capital floor. Neither release says when the September decision on base stations will be published or from when it applies.

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The vote takes place at the ITU Plenipotentiary Conference in Doha from 9 to 27 November. There, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan are four of the five candidates for the two seats that Eastern Europe and Northern Asia holds on the Radio Regulations Board, the ITU's list of candidates shows.

Ahmet Hamdi Atalay, Deputy Minister of Transport and Infrastructure, and Mehmet Koçyiğit, President of BTK, announced the candidacy at a reception at BTK's headquarters for ambassadors and diplomatic representatives posted in Ankara, the release says. Türkiye has been represented on the Council without a break for six terms since 2002, the release adds, and Mr Koçyiğit said it had been one of the eight countries representing Western Europe throughout that time. Mr Atalay said its strength lay in bringing different views closer together, building consensus and advancing solutions that benefit all member states. The conference also elects the Secretary-General, the Deputy Secretary-General and three bureau directors, posts listed in The Week Ahead of 19 October.

Nine candidates for eight seats

The Western European seat is not automatic. In 2022 Türkiye won the eighth and last of the region's seats with 122 votes, ahead of Greece with 99 and Hungary with 92, the ITU's 2022 results show. This year the candidates are the eight members elected then, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Türkiye and the United Kingdom, plus Greece. With nine candidates for eight seats, one will not be elected.

In Eastern Europe and Northern Asia, the ITU's Region C, eight states are standing for five Council seats: the five elected in 2022, Romania, Azerbaijan, Poland, Bulgaria and the Czech Republic, plus Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and the Russian Federation. Azerbaijan came second in the region in 2022 with 154 votes, while the Russian Federation, with 73, was not elected. Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan were not on the 2022 list. For any of the three challengers to win a seat, one of the five members elected in 2022 would have to lose.

Four corridor candidates for two Board seats

The Radio Regulations Board has 12 members, two each from the Americas, Western Europe and Region C and three each from Africa and from Asia and Australasia, according to an ITU explainer on the election process. It approves Rules of Procedure where the Radio Regulations are difficult to apply, considers appeals against decisions of the Radiocommunication Bureau and reports of harmful interference, and identifies matters to be referred to the ITU's radiocommunication conferences. Each member state may propose one candidate, and in each region the candidates with the most votes are elected, with a special ballot to settle a tie.

Region C's candidates are Zaza Gonjilashvili of Georgia, Sitara Mehdiyeva of Azerbaijan, Rizat Nurshabekov of Kazakhstan, Sirojiddin Usmanov of Uzbekistan and Nikolay Varlamov of the Russian Federation. In 2022 the region's two seats went to Azerbaijan's candidate, Sahiba Hasanova, with 114 votes, and to Mr Nurshabekov with 76, ahead of Slovakia's candidate with 66, Mr Varlamov with 57 and Uzbekistan's candidate, Almira Gataulina, with 33. Mr Nurshabekov is the only candidate this year who won a Region C seat last time. Azerbaijan has put forward a new candidate, and Georgia did not stand in 2022. With four of the five candidates from the corridor and two seats to fill, at least two of the four will miss out.

What the documents leave out

The ITU publishes the candidates and, after the vote, the tallies; none of the documents reviewed records voting intentions, endorsements or regional agreements, and BTK's release sets out no programme for a new term beyond the officials' statements. Candidatures had to reach the ITU by 23:59 Geneva time on 12 October, the 28th day before the conference, under its election procedures. Council and Board elections normally take a single round of voting.

The conference opens on 9 November, and the Council members and Board members it elects serve from 2027 to 2030. Corridor Signal's Spectrum Calendar lists the conference alongside the region's licence and coverage deadlines.

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The application is "subject to the applicable regulatory framework and all required approvals", the VEON release says.

The memorandum on digital payment services was signed in Almaty at the Central Asia Fintech Summit, hosted by the National Bank, the National Payment Corporation and the Kazakhstan Fintech Network, the release says. It sets out an initial five-year framework to explore how VEON's digital services could connect with Kazakhstan's national payment and digital financial infrastructure.

Areas of potential cooperation include payment and money transfer processing and settlement between financial market participants, using selected services and infrastructure of the National Payment Corporation, VEON said. The release is explicit about its limits: the memorandum "does not itself authorize the launch of new financial services", and any resulting project will proceed only after regulatory, legal and technical review and all required approvals.

The stated aim is to make payments and money transfers more convenient and accessible within the digital services customers already use, the release says. It does not say when an application for payment organisation status would be filed, which services the status would cover, or what capital or systems the operator would need to meet the requirements. VEON labels its statements on its digital finance ambitions in Kazakhstan as forward-looking.

Ahmet Kayhan, VEON's chief payments and digital assets officer, said in the release that the memorandum "provides a framework to explore how we can combine those capabilities with Kazakhstan's national payments infrastructure". Jabbor Kayumov, chief executive of Beeline Kazakhstan, said the operator's "customer relationships and experience in digital services give us a strong foundation to make everyday payments more convenient", and that it aims to explore services that fit into customers' daily lives, drawing on the national payments infrastructure and VEON's financial services experience.

The release describes Beeline Kazakhstan as serving 11.7 million mobile customers and around one million fixed internet customers, with 60 internal and external products built over five years, and as majority-owned by VEON. A VEON release of 29 September on the operator's Starlink satellite-to-mobile launch gives the mobile figure as 11.8 million. Neither release gives a reporting date for its number.

The payments push is part of what VEON calls its DO1440 strategy, which aims to expand its role in customers' daily lives through digital services alongside connectivity, with VEON Digital Financial Group intended to bring together and scale its financial services businesses, the release says. Mr Kayhan said VEON's ambition through the unit is "to build on the financial services capabilities across our markets and develop businesses that can serve more customers at greater scale".

The memorandum was one of several VEON moves touching Kazakhstan in the period. On 7 October VEON signed a 10-year agreement for Amdocs to run its core technology operations, drawing on intellectual property of QazCode, Beeline Kazakhstan's exclusive digital partner, a VEON statement said. At group level, VEON announced on 23 September a new programme to buy back 3.9 per cent of its outstanding shares, about USD 200 million at the 22 September price, including proportional purchases from its shareholder LetterOne, another release said.

None of the releases puts a figure on expected payments revenue in Kazakhstan. VEON reports its third-quarter results on 6 November, which may give the first indication of how its Kazakh financial services are performing after the memorandum.

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The announcement came a week after the ministry signed a memorandum with SpaceXAI to explore using the company's Grok models across government services. The drafts are being prepared under the Artificial Intelligence Strategy of the Republic of Azerbaijan for 2025 to 2028, the ministry says. None has been adopted. The ministry said the frameworks and requirements would be made public once the documents are finalised and approved.

Three drafts at different stages

The first, on Requirements for Responsible and Ethical Artificial Intelligence Systems, would apply to AI systems developed, enhanced or used in Azerbaijan. It is undergoing a second round of coordination with government authorities, the release says.

The second sets rules for identifying and preventing risks to personal data in the design, deployment and use of AI systems. It has been submitted to the relevant authorities for initial coordination, and work is under way on a final version, the ministry says.

The third, Requirements for High-Performance Computing Infrastructure, is also in coordination. It would set requirements for public authorities, local self-government bodies, legal entities and individuals in Azerbaijan for computing infrastructure meant to serve as a foundation for AI applications, the ministry said. The release gives no capacity figure, budget or timetable. It also says documents have been prepared for a regulatory sandbox to test innovative solutions, without describing how the sandbox will work.

The SpaceXAI memorandum

The memorandum with SpaceXAI, signed in Baku and announced on 1 October, envisages exploring the use of AI solutions built on the company's Grok models in public services and other priority areas of the country's digital transformation, the ministry said. It is not limited to a single application and covers all government agencies, the release says. The parties will assess where AI can be used and consider wider deployment of solutions that succeed.

A roadmap will be drawn up covering pilot projects, technical demonstrations and engagement with stakeholders, and each project will be carried out under a separate agreement, the release says. Deputy Minister Rashad Hasanov said the memorandum provides a framework for examining uses ranging from the internal operations of government agencies to citizens' access to services through the mygov portal, and for examining the deployment of such solutions "within our national digital infrastructure", the ministry said. The release says cooperation will follow security measures and data protection protocols, but it does not say where data handled in any pilot would be processed.

Dustin Yelinek, SpaceXAI's head of global government affairs for Latin America, said in the release that the company was pleased to partner with the ministry "to bring Grok to government and help deliver faster, higher-quality services to citizens". The ministry links the memorandum to the AI strategy and to an Action Plan for 2026 to 2028 on Accelerating Digital Development. It signed a separate framework memorandum with AZCON Holding and Microsoft Ireland Operations Limited on 25 September, which leaves the terms of specific projects to a later stage, a ministry release says.

The rulemaking runs alongside an effort to lift Azerbaijan's position in international rankings. Mr Hasanov, who heads the Technology and Innovation Working Group of the Commission on Business Environment and International Rankings, told a meeting on 12 October that Azerbaijan had risen nine places to 85th in the Global Innovation Index 2026, its largest annual improvement in the index, the ministry said. He called the ranking as a whole unsatisfactory given that the country ranked 65th in the Innovation Input category, and said a lack of data for several indicators made it difficult to assess the country's actual position.

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In mainland Türkiye and Georgia, 5G spectrum was sold in dedicated tenders and auctions and the service followed. In Northern Cyprus, Kıbrıs Telekom bought a combined 4G and 5G licence in 2022, launched 4.5G first and was given staged dates for 5G, the filing shows. The licence record also shows what spectrum has cost in a market of 0.7 million registered subscribers.

The licence record

Method: every row comes from the description of Kıbrıs Telekom in Turkcell's Form 20-F for 2025, filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission on 17 April 2026, and from the filing's risk factors on Northern Cyprus. The filing is the operator's account of its licences; no document from the Northern Cyprus regulator was available to Corridor Signal.

What the spectrum cost

The 2022 licence brought 247 MHz across seven bands for US$19.1 million including VAT, according to the filing. That is about US$77,000 per megahertz, a Corridor Signal calculation, before adjusting for VAT or for the mix of bands, which the filing does not price separately. The 2025 extension added 73.6 MHz in the 900, 1800 and 2100 MHz bands for US$5.9 million excluding VAT, or about US$80,000 per megahertz, payable in six instalments over five years, and pushed the 2G and 3G licence out by 16.5 years to 7 September 2041.

For scale, Turkcell paid US$1,224 million excluding VAT for 160 MHz in mainland Türkiye's 5G tender in October 2025, according to the same filing, or about US$7.7 million per megahertz. The markets differ in size by orders of magnitude, so the comparison shows scale, not value.

Competition and the rules around it

Northern Cyprus's National Regulatory Authority designated Kıbrıs Telekom as having significant market power in mobile access and call origination in July 2021, which obliges it to give access to mobile virtual network operators; two companies held MVNO licences at the end of 2025, the 20-F says. The regulator also sets mobile termination rates, which it raised to TRY 0.06 in October 2023, cut by 37 per cent to TRY 0.04 in November 2024 and raised by 13 per cent in November 2025.

Turkcell names two risks to its position. One is a long-expected restructuring of the incumbent, the TRNC Telecommunications Office, as a public-private partnership; if that went to one of its main competitors or brought a third mobile licence, it would hurt Kıbrıs Telekom's growth, the filing says. The other is the fixed market. In July 2025 the Northern Cyprus authorities signed a protocol with Türkiye for a nationwide fibre network with international submarine links, and Türk Telekom set up a subsidiary to build and run it. Turkcell says its Northern Cyprus brand will use 5G fixed wireless access to compete as a fixed internet provider and aims to resell fibre.

The two dates do different work. The September 2026 date lets Kıbrıs Telekom run 5G on spectrum it already uses for 4G. The 2028 date, or 2027 if the option is used, brings the 700 MHz and 3600 MHz bands into 5G use, which the filing ties to full deployment. Kıbrıs Telekom had laid 69 km of its own fibre by the end of 2025, and Turkcell's tower unit operated 115 towers on the island under right-of-use agreements, according to the filing. With the state-backed fibre network arriving at the same time, the 5G dates set the pace at which a mobile operator can compete for home broadband before fibre reaches most premises.

Neither the 20-F nor any document reviewed says whether the acceleration option will be used. That decision, and the shape of the incumbent's restructuring, are the next things to watch.

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The report, Closing the Mobile Connectivity Gap in Developing Asia and the Pacific, covers 42 countries in five subregions. The corridor states fall in its Central and West Asia subregion, which also includes Afghanistan and Pakistan, according to the full text.

Where the corridor sits

In the report's chart of 2025 index scores, Türkiye and Kazakhstan are grouped as leaders with Viet Nam, China and Malaysia. Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia and Uzbekistan are in the advanced group, the Kyrgyz Republic is among the transitioners, and Tajikistan is in the emerging group, placed above only Afghanistan, the report shows. Turkmenistan does not appear in that chart.

On the change in scores from 2020 to 2025, Uzbekistan leads all markets shown, followed by Viet Nam and Pakistan, with Georgia fourth and Tajikistan fifth, according to the report's second chart. Kazakhstan's increase is among the smaller ones, which fits its higher starting point. The report does not publish the underlying scores as a table.

The study finds that Central and West Asia lags the regional average on each of the index's four enablers, with its lowest scores in affordability and consumer readiness. About 11 per cent of the subregion's population lives outside 4G coverage, against a regional figure of about 100 million people unconnected by 4G. In the subregion, 23 per cent of mobile internet subscribers still use a feature phone or 3G handset, compared with 7 per cent across developing Asia, according to the report.

The report projects that a 4G coverage gap of 7 per cent will remain in Central and West Asia in 2030, but it attributes most of that gap to Pakistan, where average monthly revenue per unique subscriber was less than USD 2 in 2025 against a regional average of more than USD 10. The corridor states' own shortfall is therefore smaller than the subregional figure suggests, although the report does not break it out by country.

What the bank wants regulators to do

Across developing Asia, mobile internet use rose from 62 per cent of the population in 2020 to 71 per cent in 2025, and 98 per cent of people live within reach of 4G, but 1.1 billion people do not use it, the study says. Reaching universal connectivity by 2030 would cost about USD 316 billion, of which USD 132 billion is expected from the private sector and consumers under current conditions, leaving a gap of about USD 184 billion. Closing the 4G gap could add about USD 230 billion to regional output by 2030, it estimates.

Its policy list is aimed largely at telecom regulators and finance ministries. It calls for assigning available spectrum at sustainable prices, with mid-band frequencies above 1 GHz described as critical for urban traffic, introducing simplified and service-neutral licensing, enabling infrastructure sharing and lower-cost energy, removing or reducing sector-specific taxes, reforming universal service funds and keeping quality-of-service rules proportionate, according to the report. It cites Viet Nam, which cut auction reserve prices by up to 90 per cent after a failed 2023 auction and then assigned three bands, as an example.

Affordability remains the binding constraint for poorer users. A 1 GB plan costs on average 1.7 per cent of monthly gross national income per capita, below the International Telecommunication Union's 2 per cent target, but 3.3 per cent for the poorest 40 per cent of the population, the study says.

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The circular calls for care to be taken to use "Türkiye" in place of "Turkey", "Turkei", "Turquie" and similar forms in all activities and correspondence, above all in official dealings with other states and international organisations. It notes that exports have begun to carry "Made in Türkiye" instead of "Made in Turkey". The circular is in Turkish; the summary here is our translation.

The UN's page for the member state says: "The Republic of Türkiye changed its official name from The Republic of Turkey on 26 May 2022 in a request submitted to the Secretary-General by the country's Minister of Foreign Affairs." The UN Statistics Division's M49 standard, its list of country codes for statistical use, gives Türkiye, code 792.

Where "Turkey" stays

The rule governs our own words. Three things keep the older form where they have it.

• Quotes. Words inside quotation marks belong to the document, so we reproduce them as written, as in the UN sentence above. We do not change a quote to fit the rule or insert a correction into it.
• Official names and titles. The registered name of a company, the title of a law, report or dataset and the headline of an article we cite are given as their owners publish them, so that readers can find them. The sources list under each article keeps titles as published.
• Web addresses. Links are not edited: the World Bank's country page is headed Türkiye, but its address ends in /turkey.

The rule concerns the country's name, not the adjective. The currency is still the Turkish lira, as the Central Bank of the Republic of Türkiye writes on its own pages.

If our own words on Corridor Signal say "Turkey", that is an error under this rule. Use the contact form and choose Correction.

Signed: Linda Mile, editor (an avatar, not a person). The publisher is responsible for Corridor Signal.

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In the tender of 16 October 2025 Turkcell paid US$429 million for its 700 MHz block and US$795 million for 140 MHz at 3.5 GHz, a total of US$1,224 million excluding VAT, the filing says. The same tender folded the operators' existing 2G, 3G and 4.5G rights, which expire on 30 April 2029, into the new authorisation running to 31 December 2042.

The obligations timetable

Method: every row comes from Turkcell's Form 20-F for 2025, in the sections on licence risk, the IMT-2020 (5G) authorisation and payment terms. The obligations described apply to Turkcell; the filing says the procurement rules apply to Turkcell and its competitors, and the tender allocations applied to each operator, but the coverage duties of Türk Telekom and Vodafone Türkiye are not set out in this document.

Coverage and speed, by date

The first hard date is 1 January 2028, when Turkcell must cover at least 95 per cent of the population of every neighbourhood and village with 500 or more people, assessed settlement by settlement, outside locations covered by universal-service rules, according to the filing. Until then the regulator, the Information and Communication Technologies Authority (ICTA), can also ask for priority coverage of up to 150 settlements or locations a year, no more than 50 of them with fewer than 200 people.

From 30 April 2029 the duties become regional and measured. Within three years, Turkcell must cover 95 per cent of the population of each metropolitan municipality and its districts, with a minimum downlink rate of 25 Mbit/s per user at 95 per cent probability in central districts. Within five years, the same 95 per cent coverage applies to every other province and district, with a 15 Mbit/s floor. On a plain reading of the filing, that puts the metropolitan deadline around 2032 and the provincial one around 2034, a Corridor Signal reading of the dates rather than a figure in the document.

The record on earlier licences shows these duties are enforced. The ICTA fined Turkcell in 2022 over 3G settlement coverage and 4.5G tunnel coverage and required 400 additional 3G sites, which the company built in 2023 and 2024, the filing says. Fines of TRY 95.5 million were also imposed for local-production shortfalls between 2015 and 2018, which Turkcell is contesting.

Procurement and payments

The procurement rules are stricter than under 4.5G. At least 40 per cent of network hardware and software must come from suppliers with an R&D centre in Türkiye. Purchases from local manufacturers must reach 50 per cent in the first year, 55 per cent in the second and 60 per cent from the third, and at least 60 per cent of all procurement within the authorisation must be local from 30 April 2029. At least 15 per cent of annual investment must go to local manufacturing SMEs. Products that meet the definition of a National Communication Product must make up 5 per cent, 10 per cent and then 15 per cent, ratios the ICTA may double depending on supply, and shortfalls must be paid into a fund held within the operator.

The payment schedule runs alongside. From 30 April 2029 an additional annual payment of 5 per cent of gross sales, excluding VAT, applies on top of the existing monthly treasury share of 15 per cent of gross revenue, according to the filing.

For equipment vendors and investors, the dates that matter most are 2028 and 2029. The first tests whether village-level coverage is delivered on time; the second switches on the 60 per cent local-procurement floor and, for Turkcell, the extra 5 per cent levy.

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That matters because 5G in Kazakhstan has so far been built by the other side of the market. In June 2024 the government said Kcell and Tele2 were extending 5G in the largest cities and regional centres, and set the end of 2025 as the date to complete its introduction, according to a government release. Kcell reported 3,034 5G base stations and 64.29 per cent population coverage at the end of June 2026, according to its first-half results.

The licence record

Method: every row comes from VEON's Form 20-F for 2025, which lists the business licences of KaR-Tel (Beeline Kazakhstan) and Unitel (Beeline Uzbekistan) as of 31 December 2025 together with upfront spectrum payments in Kazakhstan. Rows marked 5G record the absence of any 5G licence, band or service in those tables and in the descriptions of mobile services. The 20-F does not itemise Uzbek frequency bands beyond the GSM licence.

What Beeline holds, and what it pays

In Kazakhstan, KaR-Tel's mobile licence dates from 24 August 1998 and has no fixed expiry. It holds permission to use the 800, 900, 1800 and 2100 MHz bands for mobile services, and the 2.3 to 2.4 GHz, 2.5 to 2.6 GHz, 3.3 to 3.5 GHz and 5.5 GHz bands for wireless access to the internet, the filing says. The 3.3 to 3.5 GHz holding sits in the range used for 5G in many markets, but the filing lists it as fixed wireless access, not mobile. Under the tax code, KaR-Tel paid KZT 8.2 billion in annual spectrum fees for mobile in 2025, about US$15.8 million, plus KZT 231 million for the wireless-access bands and KZT 4.5 billion as a mobile services payment.

In Uzbekistan, Unitel's GSM, 3G and 4G/LTE licences run to 7 August 2031, and its international and inter-city communication licences expire in 2026. Unitel paid US$6.66 million in annual spectrum fees and US$4.16 million in licence fees in 2025, according to the filing. VEON cites GSMA Intelligence for market shares, putting Unitel's customers at 7.6 million against 11.6 million for Ucell, 11 million for UzMobile and 3.7 million for Mobiuz, and notes that regulatory disclosures on customer numbers are not available in Uzbekistan.

How VEON describes the risk

The filing is explicit that 5G may need new rights. "If our current licenses and spectrum do not account for 5G technology we may require additional or supplemental licenses and spectrum to implement 5G technology," VEON says in its risk factors. Among the risks to its strategy it lists "regulatory expectations around the premature adoption of 5G in some of our markets". It does not name the markets.

The same document gives one constraint specific to Kazakhstan. The law there bars a foreign company or individual from owning, directly or indirectly, more than 49 per cent of an entity that carries out long-distance or international telecommunications or owns fixed communication lines without the consent of the authorities, the filing says. That applies to the fixed side of a business that already holds an unlimited long-distance and international licence.

Beeline Kazakhstan has spent its effort elsewhere. KaR-Tel's tower transfers left more than 1,758 towers on the balance sheet of VEON's KazTowerCo unit at the end of 2025, according to the 20-F, and in September 2026 it launched Starlink's satellite-to-mobile service in Kazakhstan, according to a VEON release. The 20-F also says that, after a commercial agreement signed in September 2025, Beeline Kazakhstan planned to launch satellite messaging first and data connectivity as a later phase.

The 20-F frames 5G as a licensing question in some markets rather than a network one. For Kazakhstan, the questions are whether further 5G spectrum will be offered, on what terms, and whether the 3.3 to 3.5 GHz holding can be repurposed. For Uzbekistan, the 2031 expiry of the mobile licences gives a horizon by which any 5G rights would need to be settled.

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