The Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) recently ordered the suspension of all voice call services provided by three International Gateway (IGW) operators for breaching rules.

The three operators -- Global Voice Telecom Limited, Roots Communication Limited and First Communication Limited -- will face this action for violating IGW licensing guidelines.

This includes failure to evenly distribute international calls among inter-operator schedulers and interconnection exchange (ICX) providers, and non-payment of dues in revenue-sharing with the BTRC.

They also failed to settle their outstanding debts with mobile network operators, according to a statement from the telecom regulator. The BTRC licences IGW operators to facilitate international voice traffic to and from the country.

The BTRC has mandated an immediate block on all call capacities of these IGW operators, with relevant parties having been instructed to implement the decision without delay, it said.

International calls were previously directly terminated by mobile network operators. But in 2008, the government introduced an additional layer in a bid to curb illegal Voice over Internet Protocol businesses.

A specific network topology was then implemented as per the International Long Distance Telecommunication Services policy (ILDTS), outlining a three-tier system for call services comprising IGW, ICX and Access Network Service (ANS) or mobile operators.

The IGWs initially carried out international calls through agreements with foreign telecom operators, which were then switched to mobile or landline networks via ICX operators.

However, in 2014 a seven-member group named IGW Forum proposed an experimental system that allowed only them to manage the common network switch for interconnection and call termination.

And in a move that violated regulations, the BTRC approved this experimental system that same year without amending the ILDTS policy.

As such, other stakeholders in international call termination, including mobile, ICX and ANS operators, connect solely through the common network platform controlled by this forum.

Global Voice Telecom and Roots Communication were among the seven IGW operators of it.