Undersea cable to link E Africa, Europe

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NAIROBI, Kenya, Nov 27 (AP): A consortium of companies planning an undersea cable linking eastern Africa with Europe Monday won the funding it needed to start construction, a move organisers said will bring this part of the world affordable and reliable telecommunications for the first time.
Five development finance institutions agreed to loan the consortium a total of $70.7 million. The East African Submarine Cable System has been working on the $235 million fibre-optic cable project for five years, said Lars Thunell, the executive vice president of the International Finance Corporation, the private sector lending arm of the World Bank.
Two weeks ago, an even larger project, called SEACOM, also completed its financing for an undersea fibre-optic cable. That 9,321-mile cable will link Kenya, Madagascar, Mozambique and Tanzania with international broadband cable in South Africa, India and Europe and is estimated to cost $650 million.
Three other projects have been in the works to link 22 eastern, central and southern African countries to the world's network of submarine cables.