09 September 2019

Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro has invited Russian telecom companies, along with Chinese tech giants Huawei and ZTE, to develop a nationwide 4G telecommunication network in the Bolivarian Republic.

Development of the 4G network system will become a part of the socialist corporation of the telecommunications and postal services sector of Venezuela, he said. However, Maduro did not specify the range of potential investments into the project.

During the president’s most recent trip to Russia, Moscow and Caracas reached a preliminary agreement on launching Russia’s Global Navigation Satellite System in Venezuela.

“I have ordered to make an investment and, together with China’s technologies, Huawei and ZTE technologies and the technologies of Russian companies, bring telecommunications to a new level and make a nationwide 4G network a reality in Venezuela to ensure Venezuela has fast communications, internet, and telephony,” President Maduro said in the speech during the country’s first Innovation, Development, Science and Technology Fair.

However, the political and economic situation in Venezuela has since deteriorated as the US introduced new sanctions against the Latin American state. Most recently, Washington imposed a strict ban on Venezuela’s oil exports, the country’s key source of income.