UN watchdog ‘extremely concerned’ about safety at Russian-controlled nuclear power plant in Ukraine 

The safety situation at Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP) is “deteriorating” after a nearby drone strike, the United Nations’s energy watchdog said Saturday.

The Russian military has occupied the plant since early March 2022, weeks after Moscow’s initial invasion of Ukraine.

“Yet again we see an escalation of the nuclear safety and security dangers facing the Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant. I remain extremely concerned and reiterate my call for maximum restraint from all sides and for strict observance of the five concrete principles established for the protection of the plant,” Rafael Mariano Grossi, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said in a statement.

The power plant told the IAEA on Saturday an explosive carried by a drone was set off just outside of the plant’s protected area, close to the plant’s “essential cooling water sprinkler ponds” and about 100 meters from the Dniprovska power line, the only remaining power supply for the plant, per the IAEA.

There were no causalities and no impact on the plant equipment, though the road between the two main gates was affected, the IAEA said.

Russian state media TASS reported power plant staff alleged Ukraine sent the drone strike.

“At 7:00 a.m. Moscow time [4:00 a.m. GMT], the Ukrainian drone dropped a shell on the road that runs along the power units outside the perimeter. Personnel use this road all the time. No one was injured, but once again a direct threat to the safety of personnel and the plant was created,” the report said.

Ukraine has not issued any public remark about the drone strike.

Since Russia’s takeover of the plant more than two years ago, Ukrainian leaders have repeatedly warned that Russia could hamper civilian access to power by shutting off the plant, or worse: cause a nuclear meltdown.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said earlier this month the Russian military started a fire on the grounds and said the situation at the plant “is not and cannot be normal” if it remains under Russian control.

“Nuclear power plants are designed to be resilient against technical or human failures and external events including extreme ones, but they are not built to withstand a direct military attack, and neither are they supposed to, just as with any other energy facility in the world,” Grossi said Sunday.

Fighting around the plant in 2022 prompted international alarm and eventually led IAEA inspectors to station permanently at the plant that fall. Fears were renewed in June 2023 after Ukraine said Russian forces were withdrawing from the site and accused Moscow of preparing to blow up the nuclear plant from the inside.

A 2023 Ukrainian counteroffensive in the region did not make much progress toward liberating the plant, and front-line movement in the area has mostly halted since.

The incident comes as Ukraine pushes forward with its military incursion into Russia’s Kursk region. Zelensky on Sunday said the incursion seeks to create a buffer zone to prevent future attacks by Moscow across the border, The Associated Press reported.