Residents of Kabul expressed frustration over "significant" power cuts in the capital city over the past month, saying the issue has created many problems for them amidst the cold winter.

The residents said electricity is provided four hours within 24 hours every day.

“We are facing many problems. We have electricity only for one hour. It is frustrating that in some cases, we don’t have electricity in 24 hours,” said Azizi, a Kabul resident.

“It is winter and as you know everyone needs power for heating their homes. But there are power outages all the time and everyone is facing problems,” said Noorani, a Kabul resident.

The business community said power cuts have negatively impacted factories’ operations.

The Kabul Chamber of Industry and Mines said factories will be forced to halt their operations if the Islamic Emirate, particularly Da Afghanistan Breshna Sherkat, fails to provide electricity for them.

“They should use all possible means to provide electricity to factories so that at least, we have 14 hours of power a day to compete in the market,” said Mohammad Karim Azimi, a member of the chamber. 

The country’s power distributor, Da Afghanistan Breshna Sherkat (DABS), said the power cuts are due to “technical problems” in the imported electricity from Uzbekistan, leaving the entity with no option but to distribute power four hours a day to Kabul residents. 

“For the residences, two hours of power is supplied during the day and two hours at night. We also provide electricity to government organizations. For the industrial areas, we provide 10 hours of power which means five hours to one group and another five hours to another group of industrial parks,” said Hekmatullah Maiwandi, a DABS spokesman.

Afghanistan imports 80 percent of its needed electricity from Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Iran, which costs $250 million annually.