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Latest Ukrainian drone attack targeted ZNPP host city, not nuclear plant itself

Yevgeniya Yashina said that International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)’s inspectors, who are monitoring the situation at the nuclear power plant, will be informed about the attack

MELITOPOL, January 22. /TASS/. The latest series of Ukrainian drone attacks targeted civilian infrastructure in Energodar, the host city of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP), and not the nuclear facility itself, ZNPP Spokesperson Yevgeniya Yashina has told TASS.

"The city itself, and not the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant, was targeted. Ukrainian unmanned aerial vehicles were spotted above various districts of Energodar: near its water supply infrastructure, embankment and a supermarket," she said.

She added that International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)’s inspectors, who are monitoring the situation at the nuclear power plant, will be informed about the attack.

The Reuters news agency reported earlier in the day IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi planned to pay visits to Russia and Ukraine within the next few weeks. The IAEA chief also expressed his concern about the "increased military activity" near the ZNPP. Alexey Likhachev, the director general of Russia’s state-run nuclear corporation Rosatom, said on January 4 that he planned to continue his meetings and consultations with the IAEA chief later this year.

Energodar is located on the left bank of the Dnieper River near the Kakhovka Reservoir, 135 kilometers from Melitopol, the temporary administrative center of the Zaporozhye Region. The city is home to personnel of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant and their families.

The Zaporozhye nuclear facility, with roughly 6GW of capacity, is the largest of its kind in Europe. Russia took control of the plant on February 28, 2022, in the first days of its special military operation in Ukraine. Since then, units of the Ukrainian army have periodically conducted shelling both of residential districts in nearby Energodar and the premises of the nuclear plant itself, by means of drones, heavy artillery and multiple launch rocket systems (MLRS).