Finger-pointing on nuclear plant

Shelling by both sides stirs radiation worries

KYIV, Ukraine — Fears about the potential for a radiation leak at Europe’s largest nuclear power plant persisted Saturday as both sides traded blame for nearby shelling. Ukraine said Russian forces fired on areas just across the river from the plant, and Russia said Ukrainian shells hit a building where nuclear fuel is stored.

Authorities were distributing iodine tablets to residents who live near the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant in case of radiation exposure, which can cause health problems.

Much of the concern centers on the cooling systems for the plant’s nuclear reactors. The systems require power to run, and the plant was temporarily knocked offline Thursday because of what officials said was fire damage to a transmission line. A cooling system failure could cause a nuclear meltdown.

Russian forces occupied the nuclear plant complex early in the 6-month-old war, but local Ukrainian workers have kept it running. The Ukrainian and Russian governments have accused the other of shelling the complex and nearby areas, raising fears of a possible catastrophe.

Periodic shelling has damaged the power station’s infrastructure, Ukraine’s nuclear power operator, Energoatom, said Saturday. “There are risks of hydrogen leakage and sputtering of radioactive substances, and the fire hazard is high,” it said.

The governor of Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk region, Valentyn Reznichenko, said Saturday that Russian Grad missiles and artillery shells hit the cities of Nikopol and Marhanets, each located 6 miles across the Dnieper River from the plant.

But Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Igor Konashenkov said Ukrainian forces had fired on the plant from Marhanets. Over the past day, 17 Ukrainian shells hit the plant, with four striking the roof of a building that stores nuclear fuel, he said.

It was not possible to verify either account.

The U.N.’S atomic energy agency has tried to work out an agreement to send a team in to inspect and help secure the plant. Officials said preparations for the visit were underway, but it remained unclear when it might take place.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said it was essential for International Atomic Energy Agency representatives to get to the plant as soon as possible and to help keep it “under permanent Ukrainian control.”

“The situation remains precarious and dangerous,” Zelenskyy said in his latest nightly address. “Any repetition of (Thursday’s) events, i.e., any disconnection of the station from the grid or any actions by Russia that could trigger the shut down of the reactors, will once again put the station one step away from disaster.”

Ukraine has said Russia is using the power plant as a shield by storing weapons there and launching attacks from around it. Moscow accuses Ukraine of firing on the nuclear complex.

The dispute over the plant led Russia late Friday to block agreement on the final document of the fourweek-long review of the U.N. treaty that is considered the cornerstone of nuclear disarmament. The draft document of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty review conference criticized Russia’s takeover of the Zaporizhzhia plant.

Andrii Marienko The Associated Press A view on Saturday of a crater in the street caused by a night Russian rocket attack, near damaged buildings in downtown Kharkiv, Ukraine.