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By Nuria Monreal Delgado San Pedro Benito —  The most recent blackout to affect Venezuela has now lasted at least 14 hours in several states, although electricity has already been restored to most parts of Caracas.

This latest power outage left nearly all of Venezuela in the dark at around 7 pm Friday and still persists in the western states of Barinas, Trujillo and Zulia, local residents told EFE.

People in many cities with intermittent electrical service also have opted to disconnect their appliances. According to the opposition-controlled National Assembly (unicameral legislature), thousands of these devices have been damaged in previous blackouts over the past decade.

Erika Farias, the mayor of the Libertador Bolivarian Municipality, a division of the capital district that is a government stronghold and home to more than 2 million people, said on Twitter that power had been restored there to 90 percent of the population.

The governor of Miranda state, Hector Rodriguez, said in his latest report on social media at around 2 am Saturday that power had been restored to 60 percent of customers in that region near Caracas.

For his part, the governor of the northeastern state of Anzoategui, Antonio Barreto, told EFE that virtually the entire state had lost power on Friday and that its northern section remains in the dark.

Venezuela was hit by a massive weeklong power outage that began on March 7 and another that started on Monday and lasted around 72 hours.

Leftist President Nicolas Maduro ‘s administration says the blackouts are the result of sabotage by the United States and Venezuela’s opposition and also claims the electrical system has suffered “electromagnetic” and “long-distance rifle” attacks.

The opposition blames Maduro’s government for the outages, saying ineptitude and the mismanagement of funds earmarked for the electrical sector are the root causes.

The blackouts come amid an ongoing political crisis in Venezuela.

Juan Guaido, the speaker of the National Assembly, which was rendered toothless by the creation in 2017 of the plenipotentiary National Constituent Assembly, says Maduro’s re-election victory last year was fraudulent and proclaimed himself Venezuela’s interim president in late January.

He has been recognized as such by the United States and around 50 other countries, including France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Canada, Brazil and Colombia.

The US also has imposed severe sanctions on Venezuela’s oil industry that are aimed at starving Maduro’s regime of hard-currency income.

China, Russia and India are among the scores of nations that continue to recognize Maduro.

Russia recently deployed military personnel to Venezuela, while China on Friday sent medical assistance to the country to help alleviate long-standing shortages in that sector.