Russia today denounced that Russian security agents were the target of heavy fire when they met with International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors on duty at the Zaporijia nuclear power plant.
The complaint was filed by an adviser to the director general of the Russian company responsible for civil nuclear energy, Rosenergoatom.
“Our security agents, who handled the entire process of the meeting of the IAEA inspectors, came under heavy machine gun fire”Renat Karchaa told television channel Russia-24, quoted by the official Russian agency TASS.
‘Only by a miracle did two of our security guards survive’he claimed.
According to Karchaa, representatives of the Ukrainian security services who accompanied the mission “did not understand what was happening”.
According to him, this shows the “complete lack of control” of the situation in the carriageway section.
Karchaa told TASS on Thursday that the rotation of the IAEA experts did not occur until the fourth attempt.
Still according to the same source, the UN Security Department has prevented it three times, despite the fact that the Russian side has given all security guarantees.
The nuclear power station of Zaporijia (southeast) is the largest of its kind in Europe and has been occupied by Russian troops since the beginning of the war against Ukraine.
The IAEA reported on the rotation of its experts in a statement available on its website, but without mentioning the incident denounced by Russia.
He said the rotation of experts “was long in coming” and its implementation “ended a deadlock” that defined his efforts to support plant safety.
This is the sixth team sent to the center by the IAEA since September 1, 2022, when the Agency’s Director General, Mariano Grossi, created the mission of support and assistance to Zaporijia.
“Separately, teams of IAEA experts are also rotating this week in three other nuclear facilities in Ukraine where the agency had a permanent presence in January: the Rivne, Ukraine-South and Khmelnitsky nuclear power plants.”Grossi added.
The Ukinform news agency reported today that the head of Zaporijia’s military administration, Yuriy Malashko, and representatives of UN agencies, international organizations and Ukrainian partners who are in Zaporijia have visited the site of a rocket attack on a residential building.
Two people were killed in Thursday’s attack, according to Ukrainian authorities.
Information released by the two sides about the course of the war cannot immediately be independently verified.
Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022, plunging Europe into what is considered the worst security crisis since World War II (1939-1945).
The number of civilian and military casualties is unknown, but several sources, including the UN, admit it will be high.
Source: DN
