Inspectors with the International Atomic Energy Agency finally set out for the embattled Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant on Wednesday — as another account emerged pinning the damage to the plant on Russia.
The six-reactor nuclear plant — the largest in Europe — has been a source of rising concern since Russian forces captured it early in their invasion of Ukraine and proceeded to use it as a shield for Russian artillery units.
In recent weeks, each side has blamed the other for damage to the transmission lines connecting the plant to the larger power grid — a necessary fail-safe to keep the nuclear reactors cool and prevent a catastrophic meltdown.
Amid Kyiv’s insistence that Ukrainian forces had not fired on the plant, a Ukrainian former plant worker told Fox News Wednesday that he saw evidence of Russian forces firing on the plant earlier this month in a bid to blame Ukraine for the damage.
“During this shelling [on Aug. 11], nobody from the Russian military went to a safer place or were even concerned with what was happening,” the plant worker, speaking on the condition of anonymity, told the outlet.
“All of them knew these were planned actions,” he said. “The day before the shelling, all the Rosatom [Russian state atomic agency] personnel were transported from the power plant.”
Inspectors with the International Atomic Energy Agency will visit the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine to assess the damage it may have sustained. REUTERS/Alexander Ermochenko
IAEA Director-General Rafael Mariano Grossi and Ukrainian Minister of Energy German Galushchenko arriving in Zaporizhzhia to inspect the plant on Aug. 31, 2022. REUTERS/Anna VoitenkoThe source said the missile attack hit a nitrogen-oxygen station, setting the area on fire and injuring at least one Ukrainian plant worker.
The former worker said Russian soldiers would physically and verbally assault Ukrainians at the plant, at one point threatening to shoot one of his colleagues in the knees over a dispute at the facility’s mess hall.
The source also told Fox that colleagues of his were tortured or held in a basement area of the plant if they were suspected of Kyiv-leaning sympathies.
The nuclear power plant was captured by Russia early in the invasion of Ukraine. Photo by GENYA SAVILOV/AFP via Getty Images“One of my co-workers was in captivity in the basement for 10 days just because he made a patriotic post on Facebook,” he said. “They tortured him, so he would publicly say in a video that he was paid to make such a patriotic post on Facebook and that he supports a Russian special military operation.”
The IAEA team is expected to reach the plant shortly — though there are no guarantees as the war rages anew along a front line that includes the Zaporizhzhia plant, located some 75 miles down the Dnieper River from the Ukrainian-controlled city of the same name.
Once there, the international agency hopes to conduct a full inspection of the plant and set up a permanent presence there to ward off any nuclear disasters.
Members of the State Emergency Service participating in nuclear disaster response drills amid shelling of the Zaporizhzhia plant on Aug. 30, 2022. Press service of the State Emergency Service of Ukraine/Handout via REUTERS The plant was temporarily cut off from the national power grid last week after yet more transmission lines were damaged in the fighting.
Safety systems at the plant involve a series of backup diesel generators — some of which Russia says have been damaged. A meltdown at the plant could be comparable to the 1986 Chernobyl disaster — and spread nuclear material hundreds of miles beyond Ukraine’s borders.
The US has called for a complete shutdown of the plant and the creation of a demilitarized zone around it.
According to Russia, two of the plant’s six reactors are up and running.
