A drone armed with a warhead hit the protective outer shell of Ukraine's Chernobyl nuclear plant early on Friday, punching a hole in the structure and briefly starting a fire, in an attack Kyiv blamed on Russia.
Radiation levels at the shuttered plant in the Kyiv region — site of the world's worst nuclear accident — have not increased, according to the UN International Atomic Energy Agency, which said the strike did not breach the plant's inner containment shell.
Fighting around nuclear power plants has repeatedly raised fears of a nuclear catastrophe during three years of war, particularly in a country where many vividly remember the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, which killed at least 30 people and spewed radioactive fallout over much of the northern hemisphere.
Maria Zakharova, spokeswoman for Russia’s foreign ministry, accused Ukraine’s president Volodymr Zelensky of orchestrating a drone attack to coincide with the Munich event as part of a lobbying effort to secure more weapons and money from the West.
IAEA chief Rafael Grossi said the strike and the recent increase in military activity near Zaporizhzhia “underline persistent nuclear safety risks,” adding that the IAEA remains “on high alert.”.
