The Russian military is using Ukraine’s largest nuclear power plant to shield heavy artillery and troops from Ukrainian attacks, according to a report.
The Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant in southern Ukraine has been transformed into a Russian military base, garrisoned with troops, tanks, Grad rocket launchers, and armored personnel carriers, according to the Wall Street Journal. The facility with two active nuclear reactors has also been fortified by the Russian military with trenches and land mines that surround the plant. Russian forces took control of the nuclear plant eight days after the invasion.
“They are keeping it like a base for their artillery,” a European official in the city of Zaporizhzhia told the newspaper. “They understand that Ukraine will not answer their attacks from the plant.”
UN NUCLEAR WATCHDOG DECRIES SAFEGUARDS PROCESS AT RUSSIAN-HELD PLANT IN UKRAINE
Although Ukraine controls the city of Zaporizhzhia and other towns near the nuclear facility, the danger that an artillery battle near the plant would pose makes it difficult for Ukraine to reclaim the facility.
“It seems like this is one of the Russian tactics, to take critical infrastructure and use it as a shield,” said former Ukrainian Defense Minister Andriy Zagorodnyuk. “We’re not going to storm the plant … The only way to do it would be to surround it, to take the surrounding areas, and ask them to leave.”
Zaporizhzhia is located 300 miles from Chernobyl, the site of the world’s worst nuclear disaster. The Chernobyl nuclear facility was occupied by Russian forces until early April, when troops retreated from the plant.
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In June, the United Nations’s nuclear watchdog said that Russia’s seizure of the Zaporizhzhia plant has jeopardized the ability of nuclear monitors to conduct security inspections, putting the safety of Ukrainians at risk.
The Zaporizhzhia nuclear facility is the largest nuclear power plant in Europe. It was captured by Russian forces on March 4 after a tense battle that started a fire and damaged part of the facility.
