A row over unpaid bills sparked a huge power blackout in Pakistan's biggest city, Karachi, leaving most of its 12 million residents without electricity yesterday, officials said.
The outage came after Pakistan's main power utility accused the electricity company supplying the southern port of refusing to settle debts of more than half a million dollars.
It affected bazaars, businesses and homes in the normally bustling economic hub and caused huge traffic jams as signals went out of order, witnesses said.
"KESC [Karachi Electric Supply Co] owes 34.8 billion rupees [US$548 million] to us, which they have avoided paying for many months," said Tahir Bisharat Cheema, the director general of the supply and management wing of the country's Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA).
He said the company only repaid 250 million rupees despite weekly reminders "to which they never replied."
"We sent them a final reminder on Wednesday and informed them that we would stop supplying electricity if the longstanding dues were not paid," Cheema said.
Karachi has a history of frequent powercuts, but they usually only affect certain districts for a few hours at a time. Many businesses have generators, but private households rarely do.
"We have got a small generator for our house, but it has proved highly expensive today because we don't know when power is going to come back," said Gulzar Ahmed, who lives in the middle class Liaquatabad neighborhood.
The city's power company said supplies were returning to about a third of the city later yesterday, but it accused the national utility of failing to warn it about the shutoff.
"They suddenly stopped supplying 300 megawatts to Karachi at 8am and the power supply fell to virtually zero," KESC spokesman Sultan Hassan said.
"KESC staff are making efforts to restore electricity supply but it needs WAPDA supplies resumed first" he said.
Pakistan suffered major outages earlier this year, which authorities blamed on a lack of water for hydropower facilities.
STILL COMMITTED: The US opposes any forced change to the ‘status quo’ in the Strait, but also does not seek conflict, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said US President Donald Trump’s administration released US$5.3 billion in previously frozen foreign aid, including US$870 million in security exemptions for programs in Taiwan, a list of exemptions reviewed by Reuters showed. Trump ordered a 90-day pause on foreign aid shortly after taking office on Jan. 20, halting funding for everything from programs that fight starvation and deadly diseases to providing shelters for millions of displaced people across the globe. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who has said that all foreign assistance must align with Trump’s “America First” priorities, issued waivers late last month on military aid to Israel and Egypt, the
France’s nuclear-powered aircraft carrier and accompanying warships were in the Philippines yesterday after holding combat drills with Philippine forces in the disputed South China Sea in a show of firepower that would likely antagonize China. The Charles de Gaulle on Friday docked at Subic Bay, a former US naval base northwest of Manila, for a break after more than two months of deployment in the Indo-Pacific region. The French carrier engaged with security allies for contingency readiness and to promote regional security, including with Philippine forces, navy ships and fighter jets. They held anti-submarine warfare drills and aerial combat training on Friday in
COMBAT READINESS: The military is reviewing weaponry, personnel resources, and mobilization and recovery forces to adjust defense strategies, the defense minister said The military has released a photograph of Minister of National Defense Wellington Koo (顧立雄) appearing to sit beside a US general during the annual Han Kuang military exercises on Friday last week in a historic first. In the photo, Koo, who was presiding over the drills with high-level officers, appears to be sitting next to US Marine Corps Major General Jay Bargeron, the director of strategic planning and policy of the US Indo-Pacific Command, although only Bargeron’s name tag is visible in the seat as “J5 Maj General.” It is the first time the military has released a photo of an active
CHANGE OF MIND: The Chinese crew at first showed a willingness to cooperate, but later regretted that when the ship arrived at the port and refused to enter Togolese Republic-registered Chinese freighter Hong Tai (宏泰號) and its crew have been detained on suspicion of deliberately damaging a submarine cable connecting Taiwan proper and Penghu County, the Coast Guard Administration said in a statement yesterday. The case would be subject to a “national security-level investigation” by the Tainan District Prosecutors’ Office, it added. The administration said that it had been monitoring the ship since 7:10pm on Saturday when it appeared to be loitering in waters about 6 nautical miles (11km) northwest of Tainan’s Chiang Chun Fishing Port, adding that the ship’s location was about 0.5 nautical miles north of the No.
RSS