Solène Leroux, edited by Alexis Rey-Millet 11:30 am, 09 August 2022
The bombings near the Zaporizhia power plant in Ukraine have raised concerns about the growing risk of a nuclear accident. The United States has urged Russia to halt all activity near Ukrainian nuclear facilities, while the latter blamed Ukraine for the attacks.
The United States has urged Russia to halt all military activity near Ukrainian nuclear facilities. At the end of last week, several strikes targeted areas near the site of the Zaporija power plant and its reactors. Since then, Moscow and Kyiv have denied responsibility for the bombings in an area under Russian control. The responsibility of the two belligerents is unclear, as no independent source in the state can confirm which of the two is attacking the area.
Russia and Ukraine are alarmed by the situation
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday the bombing of Zaporizhia was “potentially extremely dangerous.” He adds: “It could have disastrous consequences for a vast area, including European territory”.
For his part, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy no longer hesitates to draw a comparison with the Chernobyl disaster 36 years ago. “There is not a single nation in the world that can feel safe when a terrorist state bombs a nuclear power plant. If something irreparable happens, nobody will stop the wind reacting to radioactive contamination,” he warns.
Calls for a demilitarized zone to be created around the site
A fear also shared by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which finds the information from Zaporijia increasingly alarming, while one of the reactors had to be stopped after an attack. According to nuclear specialist Teva Mayer: “If the power supply is interrupted by a bombardment, the necessary cooling of the reactors and the storage of spent fuel elements can no longer be guaranteed, which could lead to an accident.”
The head of Ukraine’s nuclear agency, Petro Kotin, is calling for the creation of a demilitarized zone at the Zaporijia compound, which is currently occupied by around 500 soldiers and 50 heavy vehicles.