IAEA inspectors head to Zaporizhia nuclear power plant
“We are finally moving after several months (…) effort. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) goes inside the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant », the most powerful in Europe, said to journalists in kyiv, just before leaving Rafael Grossi, director general of this UN body. The site has been occupied by the Russian army since the beginning of March and has been the target of bombardments for several weeks.
“I am fully aware of the importance of this moment, but we are ready. The IAEA is ready. We will report back after our mission. We are going to spend a few days there”he added.
On Tuesday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky received IAEA experts, saying on this occasion that the international community should obtain from Russia “immediate demilitarization” of the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant. This, he added, involves “the departure of all the Russian soldiers with all their explosives, all their weapons” of this site in the south-east of Ukraine and on which kyiv and Moscow accuse each other of having carried out strikes.
“Unfortunately, Russia does not stop its provocations, precisely in the directions by which the mission must arrive at the plant”, lamented Mr. Zelensky. The governor of the oblast of Zaporizhia, Oleksandr Staroukh, had spoken in this regard a few hours earlier of missile fire on the regional capital.