The National Bank of Kyrgyzstan commented on the disabling of intersystem integration between the national payment card systems of Kyrgyzstan Elcard and Russian Mir.
The central bank recalled that according to the law, the National Bank of the Kyrgyz Republic does not interfere in the activities of banks, non-banking financial and credit organizations and other legal entities supervised by the National Bank, except for cases provided for by law. Therefore, Interbank Processing Center CJSC, commercial banks and payment organizations of the country, taking into account the risk assessment, independently make decisions on connecting/disabling the Mir card service in their infrastructure.
According to information from Interbank Processing Center CJSC, payments within the framework of intersystem integration between Mir payment system and the Elcard national system were suspended on April 3 at noon.
The following services were disabled:
- Servicing of cards in acquiring devices (non-cash payments at POS terminals and cash withdrawals at ATMs);
- Transfers from card to card;
- E-commerce: Internet payments from cards to accounts of trade and service enterprises.
«It is possible to make money transfers from the Kyrgyz Republic to the Russian Federation and vice versa using mobile applications of commercial banks in the presence of direct contractual relations between Kyrgyz and Russian commercial banks, as well as through money transfer systems without opening an account,» the National Bank said.
