Power outage plunges most of Tajikistan into darkness

DUSHANBE: A malfunction at Tajikistan's biggest power plant left most of the country in complete darkness late on Friday, the Central Asian nation's state energy company said.

The company, Barqi Tojik, said the blackout was caused by an outage at the Nurek hydroelectric power plant which provides up to 75 per cent of electric power in the nation of 8 million which borders Afghanistan.

It provided no other details but promised to fix the problem quickly. A spokesperson for TALCO, the country's sole aluminium smelter which is a major consumer of energy and a key earner of hard currency, said he did not know whether production lines had been affected.



In the capital Dushanbe, streets were completely dark as even traffic lights were left without power. But mobile communications were still working.

Tajikistan, the poorest former Soviet republic, relies heavily on hydroelectric power and plans on Saturday to start building the new Rogun plant for which Italy's Salini Impregilo this year won a $3.9 billion contract.