The leader of Abkhazia, a breakaway Georgian region backed by Russia, warned on Monday that the republic was facing a “humanitarian catastrophe“ due to a critical power shortage, Reuters reported, quoted by BTA.
Badra Gunba, acting president of Abkhazia, said he had again turned to Russia for help with power supplies after the acting energy minister said earlier this week that Moscow had not responded to Abkhazian requests for help.
Earlier this month, Abkhazia's state energy company "Chernomorenergo" said it was limiting electricity supplies to less than three hours a day to cope with reduced supplies.
“Shutting down electricity for 9-11 hours a day is a sentence on the healthcare and education systems,“ Gunba said in a video message posted today on his official Telegram channel.
“Abkhazia could face a humanitarian catastrophe. "We were in complete darkness, literally and figuratively," Gunba said.
A lush subtropical territory on the Black Sea coast, Abkhazia broke away from Georgian control in a war after the collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s, during which hundreds of thousands of ethnic Georgians fled the region.
Moscow has long supported Abkhazia and another breakaway region of Georgia - South Ossetia. Russia recognized them as independent after winning a five-day war against Georgia in 2008.
Abkhazia descended into crisis last month when protesters stormed parliament to oppose an investment deal with Russia. Then-President Aslan Bzhania was forced to resign, and Vice President Gunba became interim leader.
The crisis was further exacerbated in September by Moscow's decision to suspend social transfers to Abkhazia, which were used to pay salaries to civil servants, including doctors and teachers.
The electricity shortage, common in Abkhazia during winter, began in early December when low water levels at the Enguri hydroelectric power station imposed an emergency power outage.
On Thursday, an Abkhazian lawmaker was shot dead by his colleague near the parliament building in the capital Sukhumi.
The attack took place as lawmakers were preparing to discuss legislation to ban cryptocurrency mining because it exacerbates the electricity problem as it is energy-intensive, local media reported.
/PG/
Source: www.bta.bg