Fidel Castro once called Cuba’s power plants “prehistoric.” But the country still relies on them, contributing to the longest blackout since the collapse of its former patron, the Soviet Union.

Cuba's government on Saturday said that some electricity was restored on the island after one of the country's major power plants failed and left millions without electricity in an outage that started two days earlier.

The Energy and Mines Ministry said the country consumes 8 million tonnes of fuel annually, with only 3 million tonnes sourced from domestic production. Economic embargoes have forced Cuba to rely heavily on Venezuela, Russia and Mexico for its energy needs.