President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy v exclusive interview with ABC "World News Tonight", which took place in Kyiv, accused the Russian military of using the Zaporizhzhya NPP as a "nuclear weapon."
"You see, they occupied our Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant, six units. The largest in Europe. These are six Chernobyls - the biggest danger in Europe. They occupied it and are using it as a nuclear weapon, which is a nuclear weapon," Zelenskyy said.
"There should be no military personnel or any military equipment on the territory of the ZNPP. And NPP workers should not work surrounded by people with firearms," added the President.
ZAES is the largest power station in all of Europe, and in recent weeks it has been subjected to intense shelling by the invaders. The situation around the ZNPP caused international concern due to the possibility of a nuclear incident. Inspectors from the United Nations' International Atomic Energy Agency arrived at the site on September XNUMX to assess safety systems and working conditions at the plant.
The power plant was sometimes shut down due to shelling, and two of the six reactors operate from only one power line. Power outages threaten cooling systems that are key to preventing accidents.
IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi said in a statement on Saturday that the station had been disconnected from the last external power line but still had a backup line to receive power during the ongoing shelling.
"We already have a better understanding of the functionality of the backup line to connect the facility to the grid," Grossi said. "This is important information to assess the overall situation."
Zelenskyi also noted that he would not consider a controlled shutdown of the plant to prevent any radiation leaks, given that it supplies energy to two regions of Ukraine as winter approaches.
"I know that the Russians would like the reactors to be disconnected from the Ukrainian network and connected to the Russian one. No, we don't agree with that," Zelensky said.
