‘Playing with fire,’ says the UN as a team inspects damage at Ukraine’s nuclear reactor

As his team prepared to inspect Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant for damage from the weekend strikes, the head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog warned that whoever fired artillery at it was ‘playing with fire.’

 

The attacks on Europe’s largest nuclear power plant in Ukraine’s south came as battles raged in the east, with Russian forces pounding Ukrainian positions along the front line, according to President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

 

The bombardment of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station comes after Russian forces suffered reverses in the Kherson region in the south, prompting a Russian reaction that included a torrent of missile attacks across the country, many of which targeted power plants.

 

More than a dozen explosions jolted the nuclear plant late Saturday and early Sunday, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). The attacks, according to IAEA chief Rafael Grossi, were exceedingly troubling and utterly unacceptable.

 

‘Whoever is responsible for this must stop it immediately. You’re playing with fire, as I’ve said many times before!’ Grossi said.