Staff at Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant have been arrested and tortured by Russian forces, which have occupied the plant since March, the head of the plant’s Ukrainian operator, Energoatom, told AFP on Friday.
Petro Kotin denounced that “a regime of police brutality has been established over personnel” since the beginning of the occupation. Torture, beatings and kidnappings are very difficult right now,” he said.
According to Kotin, two people were “beaten to death” by Russian forces and around 200 employees were detained. He also complained, “We don’t know the fate of dozens of people because they were taken and we have no information about their location since then.”
Kotin, who manages Energoatom, the public institution that controls the Ukrainian factories, said: “The Russians are looking for the supporters of Ukraine immediately and they are going after them. People are psychologically collapsed.”
Russia consistently denies abuse in Ukraine and accuses Ukrainian authorities of committing crimes against the people, using civilians as human shields.
The Zaporizhzhia plant, the largest in Europe, located in southern Ukraine, is regularly bombed, for which Kyiv and Moscow are to blame.
source: Noticias
