A deadline to register all prepaid mobile telephone lines in Bahrain expires at midnight today, said a Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA) official.

There would be no extension in the deadline and that a formal announcement on how the implementation would be carried out would be made soon, the TRA told the Gulf Daily News, our sister publication.

'The extensive media campaign to inform all prepaid phone users in the country has ended and the deadline expires at midnight today,' said a TRA spokeswoman. 'Further announcements in this regard will be made soon,' she added.

The deadline, which originally expired on December 31 last year, was extended by three months, reportedly because a very large number of subscribers, both from Batelco and Zain Bahrain, had failed to register by then.

Batelco officials said they were still not aware how the directive would be implemented starting April 1.

However, Zain Bahrain data collection project manager Eyad Al Malood said all prepaid mobile telephones not registered would stop working after the deadline expires.

'The connections will not be terminated immediately because we would want to give the subscribers another chance to register,' he told the GDN.

'Subscribers waking up to find their phones are not working should contact the call centre on 107.

'There will be a grace period, as agreed with the TRA, after which the lines would be disconnected permanently and the numbers and whatever credit they may have had will be gone,' he noted.

Al Malood said the unregistered subscribers would still be able to call 999 and 107, event when they would not be able to make other calls. 'Their lines would be restored as soon as they register,' he said.

Al Malood, who is also company's pricing manager, said Zain Bahrain has been ensuring that all its prepaid subscribers are registered. 'We have called them, made announcements in the Press and even sent them an SMS,' he explained.

'For the last few weeks, there has been a voice reminder before the first call they make every day to urge them to register,' he added.

Al Malood could not say how many customers had not registered yet, but a 'very large number' had done so. 'We are hopeful most of the others would do so soon,' he said.

The TRA had early last year made it mandatory for prepaid mobile phone subscribers to register their SIM cards at Batelco and Zain offices.

The GDN had first reported last July that anyone applying for a mobile phone connection would have to submit copies of their CPR cards or passports to prove their identity.

Sources then said the measure was being introduced over concerns that some rogue elements could buy mobile phone SIM cards from cold stores and other resellers without being registered.

They said that meant anyone could get their hands on a mobile connection and people who misused them could not be traced. The registration was one of the measures, among a host of other steps being implemented, to plug all security loopholes.

The aim was also to put an end to 'prank' calls and 'textual harassment' after complaints that people were being bombarded with text messages from unknown sources.

The TRA declared on August 24 last year that there were around 600,000 Batelco and Zain mobile telephone owners whose names were not registered.-TradeArabia News Service