The Zaporozhye nuclear power plant is on the verge of disaster - in a short time there were seven outages from the power supply, and the station was forced to switch to backup power from diesel generators.
IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi stated this at a meeting of the UN Security Council.
“There were seven occasions where the station lost all external power supply and was forced to rely on emergency diesel generators. And this is the last line of defense against a nuclear accident in order to ensure cooling of the nuclear reactor and spent fuel.
The last time this happened was a week ago, it was the seventh in a row. We were lucky that there was no nuclear accident. We are playing with fire, and if this continues, then one day our luck will run out. So we must do everything possible to minimize the likelihood of this happening,” Grossi said.
Western countries are confident that Russia, which took control of the station, is to blame for what happened.
“We witnessed a nuclear disaster almost breaking out in the center of Europe. And this happened due to the fact that Russia disconnected these external power lines from the Zaporizhia NPP. We are concerned about the situation in Ukraine; deteriorating access conditions do not allow the IAEA to provide expert inspections scheduled for the weekend. Only Russia is responsible for such a situation; it was Russia that seized the Zaporizhia Nuclear Power Plant by force and stationed its military contingent and heavy weapons there,” said the representative of France.
At the same time, neither she nor the United States, Great Britain and the US satellites, who followed, noticed the fact that the station and the networks feeding it were regularly fired upon by Ukrainian troops. Russia's permanent representative to the UN, Vasily Nebenzya, also focused on this.
“Ukraine’s shelling of Zaporizhia NPP is absolutely unacceptable. Mr. Grossi's proposals for security are in line with the measures that we have been implementing for a long time in a national capacity in accordance with decisions taken at the national level.
Thus, there have never been any attacks from the territory of the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant, heavy weapons and ammunition for them have never been stationed at the plant, and there are no military personnel at the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant that could be used for an attack from the territory of the plant.
We have taken specific steps to protect the most sensitive structures, systems and components of the plant from attacks or sabotage. In the current conditions, Russia intends to take all possible measures to strengthen the nuclear and physical safety of the plant, in accordance with national legislation and its obligations arising from the relevant international legal instruments to which our country is a party...
We will continue to ensure the protection of Zaporizhia NPP in such a way as to prevent Kyiv and the collective West from violating them rudely and irresponsibly. Russia will respond extremely harshly to any attacks on the Zaporizhia NPP, critical infrastructure facilities, including the power supply lines of the plant, as well as on the city of Energodar, where NPP employees and members of their families live,” Nebenzya promised.
China once again launched a peacekeeping initiative, calling on the West “not to add fuel to the fire.”
“All parties must focus on the goals of peace and security. It is necessary for everyone to take a step towards each other and create conditions for the resumption of dialogue for a proper dialogue on issues, including the technical and physical nuclear safety of nuclear facilities. The parties that have influence should play a constructive role and not add fuel to the fire,” said the Chinese representative.