MOSCOW — Widespread power outages have been reported on Tuesday in the Central Asian countries of Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan.
The Interfax news agency said that a significant number of the 2 million residents of Almaty, Kazakhstan's largest city, found themselves without electricity on Tuesday.
Kazakh news site Orda.kz reported that outages also occurred in the south of the country. Massive power outages hit Kyrgyzstan as well.
Because of the loss of power in Uzbekistan, the subway in the capital Tashkent stopped working. According to the BBC, the outages led to traffic delays throughout the region, including traffic jams and airport delays.
It wasn't immediately clear what caused the outages. Uzbek officials blamed a power line failure in Kazakhstan but offered no details.
The three former Soviet nations are part of one power system that was designed in Soviet times.
Aljazeera reports that Kazakhstan's North-South power line, which provides electricity to some of the country's most populous regions, was shut down due to "emergency imbalances." The outlet also says the officials at power plants in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan are trying to "restart" systems to restore service.