Monitoring Desk
MOSCOW: Russian Deputy Foreign Minister, Sergei Ryabkov, said on Monday that the head of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Rafael Grossi, will visit Moscow this week to hold talks for the creation of a security zone around Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia atomic power plant.
In March, Russian troops captured the plant, the largest nuclear facility in the entire European region. It has frequently come under fire in recent months, causing fears of a nuclear disaster.
Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, said the IAEA head would meet officials from the state nuclear energy agency Rosatom and the foreign ministry. He was not scheduled to meet Vladimir Putin during his visit.
Moscow,
The IAEA is trying to get Russia and Ukraine to agree to a safe zone around the nuclear facility. Such a zone would ensure that the nuclear power plant would not be attacked and that there would be no shelling from there.
Last month Ryabkov told RIA Novosti of Russia, “the talks process is not progressing easily.”
Nuclear watchdog chief warns of disaster
After negotiations with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy last month, the IAEA head warned a nuclear disaster could happen at any time and reiterated the situation at the nuclear plant was very precarious.
“I am worried that this is becoming routine, that people may believe that nothing has been done so far, so is the director general of the IAEA crying wolf?”
“It can happen any time, and I am bound to do everything I can to prevent that from happening,” he added.
At least 46 persons were killed in Ukraine’s Dnipro city when a Russian missile strike hit a block of apartments in January.
There will be no changes at the top of defense ministry of Ukraine this week, David Arakhamia, leader of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s political party in parliament, wrote on his Telegram channel.
