SingTel chief executive Chua Sock Koong has called on regulators to give carriers like Optus the right to charge rivals WhatsApp and Skype for use of their networks or risk a major decline in network investment.

Ms Chua praised Australia's regulatory market at the Mobile World Congress event in Barcelona as one of the few countries in the world to allow a foreign player to have total ownership of a telco provider.

SingTel's Chua Sock Koong. Credit:Bloomberg

SingTel owns Optus, which is Australia's second largest provider of telecommunications services. It invested almost $1 billion during financial year 2013 in its fixed line and mobile networks.

But the CEO warned such investments would be slashed unless regulators allowed them to start charging over-the-top (OTT) rivals like WhatsApp for using their networks.