UN nuclear inspectors traveled to Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant on Wednesday and said their mission was to prevent a nuclear accident and try to stabilize the situation after weeks of bombings nearby.
A Reuters reporter watching International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) personnel in a convoy from the capital Kiev said investigators had arrived in the nearby town of Zaporizhzhia and would likely spend the night there before visiting the Russian-controlled power plant on Thursday. .
Russian officials near the facility suggested that the visit could only last one day, while IAEA and Ukrainian officials said it would take longer.
“The mission will take several days. If we manage to establish a permanent presence or a continuing presence, it will be extended. But this first episode will take several days,” Grossi told reporters at a hotel in Zaporizhzhia.
“We have a very important task to perform there – to assess the actual situation, to stabilize the situation as much as we can.”
Russia seized the power plant, the largest in Europe, in early March as part of what Moscow calls a “special military operation”.
A Russian military force has been at the facility ever since, as do most of the Ukrainian workforce working to continue operating the plant, which traditionally supplied Ukraine with 20% of its electricity needs.
While Ukraine launched a counterattack to retake territory in the south, while Kyiv and Moscow claimed success on the battlefield, clashes were reported both near the facility and further afield. Reuters was unable to independently verify these reports.
For weeks, Ukraine and Russia have accused each other of jeopardizing the safety of the factory with artillery or drone strikes and risking a Chornobyl-style radiation disaster.
source: Noticias
