MELITOPOL, July 19. /TASS/. The Ukrainian military is amassing reserves for an attack on the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant (NPP), acting Zaporozhye Region Governor Yevgeny Balitsky said on Wednesday.
"In the Zaporozhye direction, the situation remains stably tense. Fighters [of the Russian Armed Forces] are courageously defending the frontiers of the Zaporozhye Region. Meanwhile, the enemy is amassing forces, which it plans to send for an attack on the Zaporozhye NPP," the regional head warned.
"This is yet another enemy attempt to push the world to the brink of a nuclear catastrophe," Balitsky said on his Telegram channel.
Renat Karchaa, adviser to the chief executive of Russia’s Rosenergoatom nuclear power plant operator, earlier said that the probability of Ukraine’s terror attack against the Zaporozhye NPP remained high.
On July 12, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) reported that its experts had not found any mines or explosives during the nuke plant’s inspection. On the eve of a visit by IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi to Russia on June 23, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky accused Moscow of plotting an act of terror at the Zaporozhye NPP. Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov called Zelensky’s allegations a new lie. Adviser to the chief executive of Russia’s Rosenergoatom nuclear power plant operator Karchaa said at the time that the Ukrainian president’s allegations could be a sign that the Kiev regime was plotting a terror attack or a strike on the Zaporozhye nuke plant to draw NATO into the conflict.
The Zaporozhye NPP is Europe’s largest nuke plant. The station was placed under the control of Russian troops in late February 2022.