Saudi Arabia's Minister of Communications and Information Technology, Abdullah al-Sawaha, announced on Wednesday that the ban on Voice over Internet Protocol (VOIP) calls will be lifted in the kingdom within a week.

بالتعاون مع شركائنا في قطاع الاتصالات لتفعيل قيمة #العميل_أولاً، وجّهنا برفع الحجب عن تطبيقات المكالمات خلال أسبوع.

ولازلنا نطمح للمزيد. — عبدالله عامر السواحه (@aalswaha) September 13, 2017

“In cooperation with our telecom partners and in line with our #customer_first policy, we have called for the lifting of call blocking within a week ... and we still srive for more,” al-Sawaha said on his official account on the social networking site Twitter.

Al-Sawahah said that coordination between CITC and the Kingdom's telecom service providers is underway to enable customers, citizens and residents, to benefit from applications that provide voice and video communications over the Internet.

ستُشرف @CITC_SA على مراجعة استيفاء التطبيقات للمتطلبات التنظيمية، وستعمل مع شركات الاتصالات لإتاحة ورفع الحجب عن ما يتوافق مع المتطلبات. — عبدالله عامر السواحه (@aalswaha) September 13, 2017

“@CITC_SA will oversee the review of regulatory compliance requirements and will work with telecommunications companies to enable the lifting, in compliance with requirements.”

This comes amid steps within the sector to raise the level of "transparency and clarity”, including the recent launch of the quarterly index of classifying telecommunications service providers in terms of subscriber’s complaints filed, as well as the application of the user protection document and the commitment of service providers to transparency and clarity in the implementation of fair use policies, according to a statement provided by the Saudi Press Agency.

“The ministry and the Authority are working in partnership with service providers to improve the sector and improve the customer experience and develop a digital society in line with the goals of the vision of the Kingdom 2030,” the statement added.

Last Update: Wednesday, 20 May 2020 KSA 09:50 - GMT 06:50