Described herein is a method of providing synchronization between a plurality of base stations (300) in a telecommunications system which comprises providing a random access channel in each cell (320). A local base station (300) uses the random access channel in the local cell to transmit a synchronization signal to neighboring base stations. For each base station, the time differences between received synchronization signals from neighboring base stations and the local synchronization signal are calculated. Each set of time differences is either used to autonomously synchronize the local base station or is centralized in a radio network controller and a set of corrections distributed from the RNC to the base stations.