Uzbekistan currently provides only 100MW electricity: Mansor

KABUL (Pajhwok): Water and Power Minister Abdul Latif Mansor has said Uzbekistan is currently providing 100 megawatts of electricity to Afghanistan and the supply will be increased to 300MW in the next three days.

Several provinces, including central capital Kabul, plunged into darkness after Uzbekistan halted power supply due to a technical problem.

However, two days ago the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Afghanistan (MoFA) said Uzbekistan had assured reconnecting the power supply in 24 hours after resolving the technical issue in that country.

Abdul Latif Mansor, the acting Minister of Water and Power, told the BBC on Wednesday that Uzbekistan currently exported 100MW power to Afghanistan.

Mansor assured that 300MW more power will be reconnected to Afghanistan in the next few days.

According the agreement between the two countries, Uzbekistan can cut off only 20 percent of power in case of technical problems, but the country disconnected all electricity from Afghanistan, he said.

The minister said people in Uzbekistan also faced problems concerning electricity due to the cold winter wave.

Mansor rejected rumors as baseless that Uzbekistan had suspended power supply to Afghanistan in response to the Qush Tepa canal project.

“When we visited Uzbekistan, this issue was not discussed nor did Uzbek officials express any concern. The share of every country in the Amu River is known, only Turkmenistan talked about this issue, we told them that a joint committee will discuss this issue in detail”. Mansor said.

Da Afghanistan Breshna Sherkat (DABS) spokesman Hikmatullah Maiwandi corroborated Mansor’s statements, but did not provide more details.

According to a report in August,  Afghanistan imports 430MW of electricity from Uzbekistan, 440MW from Tajikistan, 202 MW from Turkmenistan and 102MW from Iran.

According to DABS, Afghanistan produces 150MW including 100MW generated by private companies.

aw/ma