Nearly two months after it was seized by Russian forces, there are few signs of the fighting at the Zaporizhzhia NPP, AFP reported following a press tour to the plant organised by the Russian military.
“Other than a scorched administrative building, the vast complex in southern Ukraine – Europe's largest nuclear power plant – appeared largely untouched by the clashes during a visit by AFP this weekend.”
Russia insists it is taking all necessary precautions at the plant, “where its troops now patrol in the shadows of its enormous and heavily reinforced red-domed reactors,” AFP noted.
"The Zaporozhye NPP is operating normally, in compliance with all nuclear, radiation and environmental safety standards," Valery Vasilyev, a major general with Russia's Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Protection Troops, told journalists at the site.
"Everything here is good!" Andrey Shevchik, the new pro-Russian mayor of Energodar, the city of around 50,000 people built in the 1970s to serve local power plants, told journalists at the site. "Residents and workers of the nuclear power plant are completely safe," he said. "All comfortable conditions are being created for them to work, to generate energy, and to keep the nuclear power plant safe."
Shevchik added that residents who had fled were returning to the city, though AFP said there was no way to verify the claim. AFP said: “It is unclear how exactly the plant is now operating, though Ukrainian workers continue to work on site under Russian supervision. AFP was unable to meet any of the Ukrainian staff at the plant or to speak to residents in Energodar.”
