KREMLIN: Moscow and Kyiv traded fresh accusations on Saturday of shelling around the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant (NPP) in Ukraine.
Russia’s Defense Ministry on Saturday accused Ukrainian forces of shelling the plant three times in the last 24 hours but said the radiation level at the plant remains normal, adding that the technical condition of the plant is monitored and maintained by staff technicians.
Ukraine’s state nuclear company Energoatom, however, blamed Russia for the shelling and said there are risks of hydrogen leakage and sputtering of radioactive substances, and the fire hazard is high.
In a Telegram post, the Energoatom said that the damage is currently being ascertained.
On Thursday, Energoatom said the Zaporizhzhia NPP was disconnected from the power grid for the first time in its history after fires at ash pits stopped the last power line from working.
Both Energoatom and Vladimir Rogov, a member of the main council of the Zaporizhzhia region’s military-civilian administration on Saturday confirmed that the two power units of the Zaporizhzhia NPP were reconnected to the grid and are producing electricity to Ukraine.
The Zaporizhzhia NPP is one of Europe’s largest nuclear power plants and generates a quarter of Ukraine’s total electricity. It has been controlled by Russian forces since early March, but its Ukrainian staff has continued to operate it. In recent weeks, Ukraine and Russia have traded accusations of strikes on the facility.
Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the situation at the Russian occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant remains “very risky” after two of its six reactors were reconnected to the grid following shelling that caused Europe’s largest nuclear power plant to be disconnected for the first time.
More than 18,000 people in the Zaporizhzhia region were left without electricity because of damage caused to power lines, after shelling started a fire near a coal power station which disconnected the reactor complex from the power grid.
Russian ex-President Dmitry Medvedev, a central ally of President Vladimir Putin, said Moscow would not stop its military campaign in Ukraine even if Kyiv formally renounced its plans to join the NATO military alliance.
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s military command claims to have beaten back assaults by Russian forces in the direction of Donetsk, making gains in the settlements of Soledar, Zaitseve and Mayorsk.
Kyiv is set to increase the number of districts on the war’s front lines where civilian evacuations will be mandatory, a Ukrainian deputy prime minister said, as those areas could be occupied by Russian forces and face central heating problems this winter.
Video from Reuters shows Russia’s Gazprom burning off an estimated $10m worth of natural gas every day at a plant near the Finnish border which experts say would previously have been exported to Germany.
Meanwhile, Russia has blocked the adoption of nuclear disarmament text at the UN following a four-week conference on a disarmament treaty, with Moscow denouncing what it said were “political” aspects of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The conference’s president said it was “not in a position to achieve agreement” after Russia took issue with the document.
On the other hand, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has called for intensifying the alliance’s military presence in the North Pole to counter Russia, as he wrapped up a visit to Canada that included a tour of its Arctic defences.
Russia has likely stepped up attacks in Donetsk over the last five days in a move that could be aimed at drawing in Ukrainian troops to destabilze Kyiv’s counterattack in the eastern Ukrainian region, Britain’s defence ministry said.
