Russian drone struck Chernobyl reactor shell, Zelensky says
A Russian drone with a high-explosive warhead hit the protecting confinement shell of the Chernobyl Nuclear Energy Plant within the Kyiv area through the evening, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky stated Friday.
Radiation ranges haven’t elevated, Zelensky and the UN atomic company stated.
Russian officers made no rapid remark, and it was not doable to independently verify Ukraine’s declare of Russian duty.
Zelensky stated that the drone strike broken the construction and began a hearth, which has been put out.
The Worldwide Atomic Vitality Company stated the strike occurred at 1:50 a.m. native time.
It stated there was “no indication of a breach within the … internal containment” shell.
The shell is a protecting cowl constructed across the fourth reactor of the plant, which exploded in 1986, inflicting one of many worst nuclear accidents in nuclear historical past.
In-built 2016, the shell is designed to restrict the discharge of radioactivity left within the reactor to the environment.
The three-year Russia-Ukraine struggle has introduced repeated warnings of risks to Ukraine’s 4 nuclear crops, particularly on the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear energy plant in southern Ukraine, which is Europe’s greatest and one of many 10 largest on the earth.
IAEA chief Rafael Rossi, stated on X that the strike on the CNPP and the latest improve in navy exercise close to the Zaporizhzhia plant “underline persistent nuclear security dangers,” including that the IAEA stays “on excessive alert.”
The IAEA stated its personnel on the web site responded inside minutes of the strike, including there have been no casualties. It stated its workers had been knowledgeable {that a} drone had struck the roof of the confinement shell.
“Radiation ranges inside and out of doors stay regular and secure,” it stated on X.
The strike got here two days after US President Donald Trump stated he would meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin to debate ending the struggle in a transfer that abruptly ended a three-year, US-led effort to isolate the Russian chief over Ukraine.
However Zelensky claimed on Telegram that the Chernobyl strike confirmed that “Putin is actually not making ready for negotiations.”
“The one state on the earth that may assault such amenities, occupy the territory of nuclear energy crops, and conduct hostilities with none regard for the results is in the present day’s Russia. And it is a terrorist risk to all the world,” he wrote.
“Russia should be held accountable for what it’s doing,” he added.
Ukraine intends to supply info to US officers in regards to the Chernobyl strike through the Munich Safety Convention beginning Friday, the pinnacle of Ukraine’s Presidential Workplace, Andrii Yermak, wrote on his Telegram channel.
