Ukraine has warned of a Russian attack on Europe’s largest nuclear power plant in the south of the country: “We now have information from our secret service that the Russian military has placed objects resembling explosives on the roofs of several reactor blocks of the Zaporizhia NPP,” President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his daily video address last night. An attack on the power plant could possibly be simulated and Ukraine accused of being the mastermind. According to the assessment of the Ukrainian general staff, the explosive devices appear to damage the roofs of the third and fourth reactor units, but not the reactors themselves. Zelenskyj called for international pressure on Russia to prevent this.
Moscow, on the other hand, had previously accused Kiev of planning an attack on the nuclear power plant itself. As early as Wednesday night, the Ukrainian armed forces would try to attack the power plant with rockets and drones, Renat Karchaa, adviser to the head of the Russian atomic energy agency Rosenergoatom, claimed yesterday on state television. Accordingly, not only should the nuclear power plant be fired upon, but a bomb containing nuclear waste should also be dropped at the same time. Neither side provided evidence to support the allegation.