Accident at Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant ‘can’t be excluded’: IAEA

The specter of a nuclear accident in Ukraine remains to be very excessive, the director of the Worldwide Atomic Vitality Company (IAEA) advised Euronews on Monday.

Rafael Mariano Grossi, who met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelesnsky final week throughout a go to to the war-torn nation, described the scenario across the Zaporizhzhia nuclear energy plant as very precarious and mentioned that reaching a deal on the institution of a protected zone is hard because the army are concerned within the talks.

“We did have conditions the place this facility was shelled, attacked instantly. There’s nonetheless lots of army exercise round. So it can’t be excluded that this occurs once more,” Grossi advised Euronews.

“So earlier than it does, we are able to take an interim sensible measure, which might be to exclude this big facility from a army motion assault,” he added.

Grossi spoke from Brussels the place he briefed European Union overseas affairs ministers on the scenario on the bottom. He can even present an replace to the European Parliament on Tuesday.

The IAEA has a group on the bottom monitoring the nuclear plant, which isn’t producing vitality in the meanwhile and is underneath the management of Russian forces. Related IAEA missions are additionally stationed on the different Ukrainian nuclear energy crops in Rivne, Khmelnytskyi and Chornobyl.

Grossi is to go to Moscow in early or mid-February for a face-to-face assembly with Russian President Vladimir Putin. 

“That is actual battle. And so, sadly, we are able to agree issues round diplomatic tables after which on the market, one thing else may occur. Because of this we are so involved,” he mentioned. 

The continuing protests in Iran and the stalled nuclear deal additionally featured excessive on his agenda in Brussels. The IAEA is a guarantor of the so-called JCPOA and wish to see the nuclear deal that disintegrated underneath the Trump period revived. Grossi desires to maintain the road open to Tehran to make clear findings on enriched uranium.

“I actually hope Iran will heed our name and I will journey there and re-engage on the political degree to ensure that nothing occurs there that may destabilise an already unstable area,” Grossi mentioned. 

EU ministers agreed on additional sanctions in opposition to Iran on Monday to cease the repressive assaults on harmless individuals.