Internet Outage in Pakistan As the Opposition Begins Its Election Campaign

Earlier this month saw widespread disruptions to Pakistan's internet and social media services as Imran Khan's party was ready to start a huge online campaign in front of next month's elections.

They claim that the rejection of Khan and the majority of their top leaders inside the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party (PTI) as candidates for the February 8 election is an attempt by the military-led establishment to prevent them from running.

To introduce its manifesto and gather campaign funds, PTI had scheduled a sizable national and international telethon for Sunday night. 

However, internet outages began that early in the evening.

Pakistan internet disrupted as opposition launches election campaign

According to Netblocks, a monitoring group that keeps an eye on cybersecurity and internet governance, "the incident coincides with previous social media filtering events which have all been imposed during opposition party rallies or speeches by opposition leader Imran Khan."

Network providers throughout the nation were being impacted, according to Netblocks Director Alp Toker, who spoke with AFP.

"Such nation-scale social media targeting political activities is almost unprecedented at this scale. 

Venezuela is one other nation that has used similar measures to limit opposition speeches and rallies," he stated.

The disruption was denounced by the Pakistani Human Rights Council as "a violation of international law".

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