Du is not involved in any negotiations with the Canadian manufacturer of BlackBerry devices but will abide by any decision taken by the UAE’s Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA), its CEO has said.

Osman Sultan said du, one of the UAE’s two service providers, had completed technical preparations to suspend BlackBerry services on October 11 in case TRA confirms the ban on that date.

“Du is not involved in any negotiations with the BlackBerry makers [Research in Motion] regarding a technical solution that will conform to existing laws and regulations in the UAE,” he told reporters on Tuesday.

“TRA is the only party that is authorised to conduct such negotiations… service providers have to abide by its instructions no matter what they are.”

Sultan said du had not noticed any decline in the number of its BlackBerry subscribers since the company and etisalat announced plans last week to halt BlackBerry Messenger, e-mail and web browsing services.

Newspapers also quoted him as saying the decision to ban these services would not have a major impact on du’s profitability, adding that the package of alternative services announced by du for its subscribers does not constitute a financial burden on clients.

“On the contrary, we are offering alternative services that have a value of 10 times the existing services,” he said.

According to the semi-official Alittihad Arabic language newspaper, du has around 100,000 BlackBerry users, accounting for nearly a fifth of the UAE’s total subscribers of 500,000 to that device’s services.