Ukraine prolongs outages after power plant strikes
KIEV
Kiev on Thursday said it would maintain emergency blackouts across the country and import electricity from Europe to ease the fallout from Russian strikes on its power plants.
Attacks on Ukraine's thermal and hydroelectric plants in recent weeks have forced authorities to take sweeping measures to keep the grid from total collapse.
"Restrictions on household and industrial consumers are being applied throughout the day, throughout Ukraine," the energy ministry said in a statement.
It has called on households and private businesses to limit consumption and recently increased imports from neighbouring countries to maintain supplies.
Authorities in the capital Kiev are aiming to guarantee residents between four and six hours of electricity everyday, according to schedules published online.
Businesses have reverted to generators to keep the lights on and doors open to customers during scheduled and unscheduled emergency outages.
And residents have reported widespread disruptions, including to elevators in high-rise residential buildings and traffic lights on key thoroughfares in the capital.
Russia's recent aerial campaign has targeted powerplants themselves, changing tactics from an earlier strategy of hitting distribution centres that could be more easily repaired.
Officials and analysts have estimated the damage could take years and billions of dollars to repair.
The Kremlin has repeatedly denied its forces target civilian infrastructure, and claim they only attack military-linked facilities.
