An extensive internet blackout across several Afghan provinces has caused significant disruption to banking services, prompting the authorities to grant exemptions for financial institutions even as wider restrictions on communications remain in place, The Khaama Press News Agency (TKPNA) reports.

Reports from northern Afghanistan indicated severe difficulties in processing financial transactions after WiFi services were suspended in a number of provinces, including Balkh. In Mazar-i-Sharif, banking operations were reportedly brought to a standstill until local officials moved to exempt lenders, the electronic ID office and other key agencies from the curbs the agency added. Partial service was subsequently restored.

The shutdown, affecting five provinces - Kandahar, Uruzgan, Helmand, Nimroz and Balkh - has raised alarm among government officials and business leaders. They warned that state institutions and modern administrative systems are increasingly dependent on stable digital connectivity.

A delegation comprising senior figures from the economy, finance ministry and central bank travelled to Kandahar to caution local leaders that prolonged restrictions risk paralysing essential services reliant on digital networks, TKPNA added.

The monitoring group NetBlocks confirmed the outages, noting that mobile internet access has also been throttled to 2G speeds, compounding the disruption.

Critics meanwhile contend that the measures run counter to recent government statements positioning Afghanistan as open to international investment. Severing internet access, they argue, undermines banking, commerce and everyday economic activity. Because of this, analysts warn that curbing connectivity risks undoing nearly two decades of progress in Afghanistan’s digital infrastructure, deepening isolation from global markets and exacerbating an already precarious humanitarian and economic outlook.