VIENNA, March 6. /TASS/. The situation at the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant underscores the need in establishing a safety and security zone there, Rafael Grossi, Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said ahead of an IAEA Board of Governors meeting on Monday.
"The situation at the Zaporozhye NPP underscores the urgent need to establish a nuclear safety and security protection zone at the site," Grossi said. "I have intensified my consultations with both Parties and rely on your continued active support to achieve this important measure without further delay," he added. According to Grossi, the ongoing military operations and what he said were stressful working conditions at the nuke plant compromise nuclear safety and security at the plant. Over the past few weeks, there has been an increasing security presence at the site, he added.
Since November, Grossi emphasized, the IAEA "has completed five deliveries of donated and procured equipment to different organizations in Ukraine, with many more expected in the coming months." In accordance with Ukraine’s Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement and Additional Protocol, the IAEA has continued "to undertake its vital safeguards verification role in Ukraine," including by conducting in-field activities, he said.
"As a result, we can confirm that nuclear material under safeguards remains in peaceful activities and that safeguarded facilities are not being used for undeclared production or processing of nuclear material," the IAEA chief stated.
Last week, the long-delayed rotation of the IAEA mission was successfully completed at the Zaporozhye nuke plant and the sixth team of IAEA experts is now on site, he reported.
On Saturday, Renat Karchaa, an adviser to the director general of Russia’s Rosenergoatom nuclear power engineering company, said that Ukraine’s false-flag operation to attack the Russian security team accompanying the IAEA inspectors was designed to replace the issue of establishing a safety zone around the ZNPP, currently being discussed between Russia and the UN nuclear watchdog, with the idea of demilitarizing the nuclear facility being sought by Ukraine. For Kiev, the nuke plant has been an instrument for solving tasks that are distant from nuclear energy and a means to manipulate public opinion, including that in the West, he said.
On Friday, Karchaa condemned as a blatant provocation the incident where fire was deliberately opened from Ukraine on the Russian security team meeting IAEA experts who were on their way through the gray zone in the Zaporozhye Region to the Zaporozhye NPP for rotation.
Situation around ZNPP
Russia has repeatedly drawn international attention to Ukrainian shelling of the Zaporozhye NPP. Grossi stated in early December that an agreement to establish a safety zone around the Zaporozhye plant could be reached soon. Rosatom CEO Alexey Likhachev previously noted that the safety model being discussed with the IAEA chief ruled out any shelling of the facility. Meanwhile, the Ukrainian side has been insisting on the demilitarization of the ZNPP, which implies the withdrawal of the Russian security team from there.
Karchaa emphasized that Russia supported the idea of establishing a safety and security zone around the nuclear facility as he said a moratorium on any "artillery activities" in the area were an initial and essential condition for that. Russia will never undermine its national interests or the interests of its nuclear sector, he assured.