Ukraine Cuts Energy to the Occupied East

Ukraine has suspended all electricity provisions to eastern regions of the country occupied by Russia-backed separatists.

On July 26, Ukraine’s state energy corporation, Ukrenergo, halted power supplies to the occupied territories of the Donetsk region. Previously, on April 25, the company also cut off electricity to the occupied Luhansk region.

“Now, the occupied areas of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions are not consuming electricity produced at power stations on government-controlled Ukrainian territory,” Ukrenergo’s acting director, Vsevolod Kovalchuk, wrote on Facebook.

According to Kovalchuk, the occupied Starobeshevska and Zuyivska thermo-electric power stations, other energy producers on the occupied territories, and electricity provisions from Russia are currently covering the occupied territories’ power needs.

Energy deliveries from Russia are carried out on lines excluded from the list of interstate energy lines, Kovalchuk wrote. This power flow is also not included in the overall “Ukraine-Russia-Belarus” energy balance.

/ Translated and adapted by Matthew Kupfer