Facebook says a programme that had been giving free basic internet services to more than 3 million Egyptians has been shut down.

In a statement to the Associated Press on Wednesday, Facebook says it is “disappointed” by the shutdown and hopes to “resolve this situation soon” so the programme can be restored.

It says the service, which will no longer be available as of Wednesday 30 December, provided internet access without data charges to more than a million people who were not previously connected.

The programme, launched with Etisalat Egypt, had been in place for some two months and was recently highlighted at an entrepreneurship fair in Cairo. It was not immediately clear why the program had been halted.

Neither Etisalat nor Egyptian officials could immediately be reached for comment.

