Telecom companies from the Marshall Islands and Federated States of Micronesia say US military indecision is to blame for hold-ups in a project to lay a communications cable across the region.
The General Manager of the Federated States of Micronesia Telecommunications Corporation, Takuro Akinaga, says they're waiting for the U.S. military to tell them what it wants so they can come up with a loan package
The Marshall Islands National Telecommunication Authority general manager, Tony Muller, says they can't go to the US Rural Utility Service without information from the US military.
The plan, under discussion for three years, is for a 67 million US dollar underwater fibre-optic cable linking Pohnpei, the capital of the Federated States of Micronesia -- and Kwajalein and Majuro atolls in the Marshall Islands -- to Guam and Australia.
The cable is expected to have a greater capacity and lower cost than satellites.
The U.S. military interest in the submarine cable comes from the missile testing range at Kwajalein in the Marshall Islands.
A meeting of the Joint Telecommunications Board established by a Compact of Free Association between the US and the two island nations is tentatively scheduled to take place in Honolulu in mid-January.
