EU Monopoly Charges For Polish, Slovak Telecoms

BRUSSELS (AP) — European Union regulators on Monday charged Polish and Slovak telecoms operators with monopoly abuse, saying it suspected that Telekomunikacja Polska and Slovak Telekom both tried to hinder rivals from offering broadband Internet in both countries.

The European Commission said it would deal with each case separately and there was no deadline before it took a final decision on whether they broke the law — which could see them fined up to 10 percent of their annual global revenue.

Both companies are their country's leading phone and Internet provider and control the main telecoms infrastructure which means they could hurt rivals by refusing to give them access to the networks that supply customers.

The European Commission said its investigations showed its "worries about the situation" in eastern European newcomers to the EU "where competition is still at an early stage of development."

Telekomunikacja Polska, or TP, is 48.6-percent owned by France Telecom. Regulators said they would investigate whether the company refused to allow rivals to access bitstream — a high-speed Internet link between customers and the local telecoms network — and the local telephone network between customers and the central exchange.