“If there’s an explosion, that’s the end for everyone,” Zelensky said.
By World Israel News Staff and Associated Press
The Russian military seized Ukraine’s largest nuclear power plant on Friday morning after a massive fire was extinguished.
“Operational personnel are monitoring the condition of power units,” the country’s State Emergency Service said on social media.
“Russian tanks are equipped with thermal imagers, they know where to shoot,” Ukrainian President Vlodomyr Zelensky stated, indicating that the plant was intentionally targeted.
“If there’s an explosion, that’s the end for everyone,” he said.
“This is the first time in the history of mankind that a state has resorted to nuclear terror,” he added.
Rafael Grossi, director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said he was “deeply concerned with the situation.”
Grossi said that the building hit was a training center and “not part of the reactor,” and that the Ukrainians are still in control of the reactor.
“What we understand that this projectile is coming from the Russian forces. We do not have details of what kind of projectile it is.”
Grossi said there has been no release of radiation and that the fire had been extinguished. Two people on the site were injured in the fire.
Only one reactor at the plant is operating, at about 60%, he said.
Ukraine’s state nuclear regulator concurred that no changes in radiation levels have been recorded so far . But it caused worldwide concern — and evoked memories of the world’s worst nuclear disaster, at Ukraine’s Chernobyl.
The shelling of the plant came as the Russian military advanced on a strategic city on the Dnieper River near where the facility is located, and gained ground in their bid to cut the country off from the sea. That move would deal a severe blow to Ukraine’s economy and could worsen an already dire humanitarian situation.
With the invasion in its second week, another round of talks between Russia and Ukraine yielded a tentative agreement to set up safe corridors to evacuate citizens and deliver humanitarian aid to the country. A handful cities are without heat and at least one is struggling to get food and water.
“The real threat to Ukrainian lives continues to be the violent invasion and bombing of their country,” the American Nuclear Society said in a statement.