Armed groups control electricity in Iraq, dividing grid into fiefdoms: stations abandoned at night to whatever group controlled an area

Jump to Comments

Armed groups increasingly controlled the antiquated switching stations that channelled electricity around Iraq and they were dividing the national grid into fiefdoms, reported The Australian Financial Review (24/8/2007, p.55). Power-cuts the norm in city: Those fiefdoms often refused to share electricity generated locally with Baghdad and other power-starved areas in the centre of Iraq. This development added to existing electricity problems in Baghdad, which had been struggling to provide power for more than a few hours a day because insurgents regularly blew up the towers that carry power lines into the city. The government lost the ability to control the grid after the US-led invasion in 2003, when looters destroyed the automated dispatch centre, Electricity Minister, Karim Wahid, said in a briefing with US military officials.

Threats to electricity workers: The briefing had been designed to highlight successes in the US-financed reconstruction program, but it took an unexpected turn when Wahid, a highly respected technocrat and long-time ministry official, answered questions from the Arabic and Western news media. Because of the lack of functioning dispatch centres, Wahid said, ministry officials in Baghdad had been attempting to control the flow of electricity from huge power plants in the south, north and west of the country by calling local regional officials and ordering them to physically flip switches. But those officials would refuse to follow orders when armed groups threatened their lives, he said, and stations were abandoned at night to whatever group controlled an area.

0 Comments

Filed under Electricity News, Iraq, Power Station Security