“The news from our team yesterday and this morning is extremely disturbing,” UN agency chief Rafael Grossi said in a statement – Russian bombings, says Ukrainian nuclear plant operator
Ukraine’s Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, which is under Russian control, was rocked by shelling today, whichs condemned by the head of the UN agency on nukes which he said such attacks risked causing a major nuclear disaster.
Repeated bombing of the plant in southern Ukraine has led to concerns that it could cause a major accident just 500km from the site of the world’s worst nuclear accident, the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.
More than a dozen explosions rocked the Zaporizhia stationwhich Russia seized shortly after it invaded Ukraine in February, early last night and today, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said.
An IAEA team on the ground said there was damage to some buildings, systems and equipment at the plant, Europe’s largest nuclear power plant. The IAEA team was able to see some of the explosions from their windows.
“The news from our team yesterday and this morning is extremely disturbing,” UN agency chief Rafael Grossi said in a statement.
“Explosions occurred at the facilities of this large nuclear power plant, which is completely unacceptable. Whoever is behind this must be stopped immediately. As I have said many times before, you are playing with fire!’
Zaporizhia NPP has six Soviet-designed VVER 1000 V-320 reactors containing uranium 235, which has a half-life of at least 700 million years.
The reactors are shut down but there is a risk of the nuclear fuel overheating if the energy supplying the cooling systems is interrupted. The bombings have repeatedly destroyed cables.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said earlier that Ukraine fired shells into cables feeding the station, while TASS reported that some of the plant’s storage facilities were affected, citing an official from Russia’s nuclear power agency Rosenergoatom.
“They bombed not only yesterday, but today, they are bombarding right now,” said Renat Karcha, an adviser to Rosenergoatom’s CEO, adding that any artillery attack on the facility was a threat to nuclear safety.
Kartsaa said the shells were fired near a dry nuclear waste storage facility and a building housing spent nuclear fuel, but so far no radioactive emissions have been detected, according to TASS.
The station provided about a fifth of Ukraine’s electricity before Russia invaded on February 24, and was forced to run on backup generators several times.
The Ukrainians “show” the Russians behind the bombings
For his part, the Ukrainian operator of the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant says that Russian forces are behind the bombing. Nuclear power company Energoatom said there were at least 12 hits to the plant’s infrastructure facilities, Reuters reports.
The company posted on Telegram that the list of damaged equipment testifies that the attackers “targeted and disabled precisely the infrastructure necessary to restart the 5th and 6th power units” and restore energy production for the country’s needs.
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