The United Arab Emirates said on Wednesday that a decision to cut some BlackBerry smartphone services was final, as users in Saudi Arabia expressed shock at their telecom regulator's decision to suspend services.
The UAE "Telecommunications Regulatory Authority's (TRA) decision to suspend certain Blackberry services from October 11th is final," the official WAM news agency quoted a statement by TRA director-general Mohammed al-Ghanem as saying.
The UAE announced on Sunday that BlackBerry services including messenger, web browsing and email will be suspended because they "allow individuals to commit violations" that the country cannot monitor.
However, Ghanem added on Wednesday that "We remain open to discussions in order that an acceptable, regulatory-compliant solution might be developed and applied," WAM reported.
In Saudi Arabia, the Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC) announced late on Tuesday that it had ordered the kingdom's three mobile phone providers to block BlackBerry services from Friday for failing to conform with regulations.