“Defected to the Enemy”
Kyiv calls new nuclear power plant boss in Zaporizhia “traitor”
12/01/2022, 5:19 p.m
Ukrainian nuclear power plant operator Energoatom has fired the deputy chief engineer at the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant. He accepted the offer from Moscow to take over the management of the plant for the Russian occupying forces. His former employer is outraged.
The state-owned Ukrainian nuclear power plant operator Energoatom has accused the new Ukrainian director of the Russian-occupied Zaporizhia nuclear power plant of treason. The former deputy chief engineer of the power plant, Yuri Chernichuk, “betrayed Ukraine and defected to the enemy,” Energoatom boss Petro Kotin told Telegram.
On Wednesday, Chernichuk accepted the Russian offer to take over the management of the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant. In his opinion, this was “the only right decision,” he explained. Energoatom boss Kotin sees it differently: “Instead of doing everything to liberate the power plant as quickly as possible, he decided to help the Russian occupiers to legalize their criminal appropriation,” he explained.
Energoatom claimed to have fired Chernichuk. Kotin warned that “sooner or later” he would have to justify his actions “to the law and to the people”.
Almost half of the power grid is out of service
Russia occupied the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant in southern Ukraine shortly after the war began in February. For months Moscow and Kyiv have accused each other of being responsible for attacks around and on the nuclear power plant. The largest nuclear power plant in Europe is not far from the front in the Zaporizhia region, which Russia has declared annexed.
Meanwhile, the private Ukrainian electricity company DTEK reported that after the Russian attacks on the energy infrastructure a week ago, almost half of the electricity grid is still out of order. “Russia has destroyed 40 percent of the Ukrainian energy system with the terrorist missile attacks,” DTEK explained in the online service Telegram. About ten employees were “killed and injured” in the attacks, it said.