VIENNA/MOSCOW (Reuters) – The director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency will visit the Russian Baltic exclave of Kaliningrad on Wednesday to discuss the safety of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, located near the front line of fighting between Russian and Ukrainian forces, an IAEA spokesperson said.
Grossi visited the plant, in Ukrainian territory controlled by Russia, last week. He said the situation had grown worse and military activity around the site – Europe’s largest nuclear facility – had intensified in recent months.
Grossi and several national leaders have repeatedly warned that attacks on the plant – for which Ukraine and Russia have blamed each other – could trigger a Chornobyl-like disaster.
Kyiv has accused Russia of using the facility as a weapons depot, something Moscow denies.
Russian news agencies had earlier reported Grossi would visit Moscow to discuss Zaporizhzhia, citing a senior diplomat.
Russian forces have controlled the plant since the first weeks of the war. Last October, President Vladimir Putin ordered his government to transfer the plant, its assets and its staff to a new Russian entity, a move decried as expropriation by Kyiv.
Grossi has succeeded in having IAEA monitors stationed at the plant, but has so far been unable to secure the establishment of a demilitarised zone around it.
(Reporting by Francois Murphy and Jake Cordell; Editing by Kevin Liffey)
