The telecommunications watchdog used its powers for the first time yesterday, cancelling the licence of a firm convicted twice of breaking Hongkong Telecom's international monopoly by setting up illegal microwave links with the mainland.
The Office of the Telecommunications Authority named the firm as Uniglobe Telecom (Far East) Limited.
The firm's facilities have been raided twice by police, who discovered microwave equipment aimed over the border.
Uniglobe was convicted after the courts found it had been collecting calls in Hong Kong, sending them over the border, then routing them into the domestic mainland network, breaking Hongkong Telecom's international monopoly.
The link would enable the firm to carry calls from Hong Kong at the low rates offered to domestic calls in the mainland.
In October, Judge Fergal Sweeney said the firm must have been making big profits to risk a second prosecution. Yesterday, an authority spokesman said: 'To tolerate such activities would be unfair to operators who abide by the law.' The authority 'will continue to monitor the market and take stern actions against operators who are in breach of the law', he said.
