Rosatom says two Zaporizhzhia plant facilities damaged in overnight attack

Two facilities at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant were damaged in an overnight attack, Russia’s state nuclear corporation “Rosatom” said on Monday.

“Rosatom” Director General Alexey Likhachev said a laboratory building about 200 metres (656 feet) from the plant’s fourth and fifth reactors, as well as a radioactive waste processing facility, had been damaged. Russian state news agency Tass reported his remarks.

The roofs of both facilities were damaged, but there was no threat to nuclear safety, Likhachev said. He added that plant workers were continuing to keep the main equipment in safe condition despite ongoing attacks.

“Rosatom” had informed the International Atomic Energy Agency that repairs were needed and called for a temporary ceasefire to allow the work, Likhachev said.

He said repairs to transformers would normally be routine but now posed a direct risk to repair crews. The parameters of a temporary, localized truce at the plant were being coordinated, he added.

Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, and one of the world’s 10 largest, has been under Russian control since March 2022. International Atomic Energy Agency personnel have been stationed there since Sept. 1, 2022, amid persistent concerns about a potential nuclear disaster and repeated accusations by Moscow and Kyiv that each side has attacked the area around the facility.