Officials: Moldova's energy system hit by emergency power outage due to problems in Ukraine's grid

Moldova's energy system was hit by an emergency power outage on Monday due to problems in neighboring Ukraine's power grid, officials said, leaving the capital Chisinau and other parts of the country without electricity, Reuters reported.

According to a statement from the Moldovan Ministry of Energy published on the Telegram app, disruptions in the Ukrainian network led to a voltage drop on one of the transmission lines that supplies Moldova with electricity.

Most municipalities in Chisinau were without electricity, Mayor Ion Ceban said on Telegram, and officials added that traffic lights were not even working.

Ukrainian energy officials have not yet commented on the situation. Emergency power cuts have also been imposed in some parts of Ukraine, energy company DTEK said, and the Kiev metro has stopped operating.

Due to the emergency in the network, there was also a temporary interruption of water supply in Kiev, officials said.

Reuters reports that Ukrainian Energy Minister Denis Shmyhal said that technical failures on two transmission lines connecting Ukraine, Moldova and Romania caused a power outage across Ukraine's electricity grid today.

Shmyhal said in a post on Telegram that at least three regions and the capital Kiev were affected by emergency power outages.

He said he expects power supply to be restored in the coming hours.

Ukraine's power grid has been one of the main targets of months of Russian strikes, and consumers there have been facing significant restrictions on electricity supply for weeks.

Russia has been targeting key infrastructure in recent days, leaving many parts of Ukraine without electricity and heating.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said yesterday that neither Moscow nor Kiev had carried out attacks on energy targets following an agreement that, at the initiative of Washington, provided for Russia to refrain from such attacks.

"In all our regions, there were really no strikes on energy facilities from Thursday evening to Friday. Ukraine is ready for reciprocity and today we did not target Russian energy facilities," Zelensky said yesterday in his evening video address.

He also said at the time that Russia was engaged in "redirecting" its military activities by attacking logistics, such as rail hubs.

United States President Donald Trump said the day before yesterday that he had asked Russian President Vladimir Putin not to allow his military to bomb Kiev and other places in Ukraine for a week - due to the freezing winter.

"I have personally asked President Putin not to open fire on Kiev and other cities and towns for a week, during this... exceptional cold," Trump said the day before yesterday at a meeting of his cabinet at the White House.

Trump then claimed that Putin "agreed to it."

Zelensky said the day before yesterday that he expects the implementation of an agreement under which Russia will not target Kiev and other cities for seven days due to winter weather conditions, as announced by Trump.

The Kremlin announced yesterday that Putin had agreed to Trump's personal request to halt attacks on Kiev until February 1 in order to create "favorable conditions" for peace talks.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters at the time that "President Trump did indeed make a personal request to President Putin to refrain from attacking Kiev for seven days, until February 1, in order to create favorable conditions for negotiations."

When asked if Putin agreed, Peskov replied: "Yes, of course, there was a personal request from President Trump."

It was not clear whether Peskov was using "Kiev" only for the capital, where many have been left without heating and electricity after Russian attacks during the war in Ukraine, or for the entire country, Reuters reports.

Zelensky said yesterday that Ukraine is ready to retaliate if Russia continues to attack energy infrastructure. He added at the time that there is no formal ceasefire between the two countries.

"The Americans said they wanted to raise the issue of de-escalation, with both sides showing certain steps towards refraining from using long-range capabilities in order to create more space for diplomacy," Zelensky told reporters in Kyiv at the time.

He added that "at this stage this is an initiative of the American side and the US President personally," and that Ukraine considers it "an opportunity, not an agreement."