Fire Put Out At Europe’s Largest Nuclear Power Plant

By Staff, Agencies

A training building outside the largest nuclear power plant in Europe caught fire during intense fighting between Russian and Ukrainian forces, according to Ukraine’s state emergency service.

Dmytro Orlov, mayor of the nearby town of Energodar, said on his Telegram channel that the incident occurred as a result of continuous enemy shelling of buildings and units of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused Russia of resorting to “nuclear terror” and seeking to repeat the Chernobyl disaster after saying that Russian forces attacked a nuclear power plant.

In a video message released on Friday, Zelensky urged world leaders to prevent Europe from “dying from a nuclear disaster” after Kiev said a nuclear plant at Zaporizhzhia, an industrial city in the southeast, caught fire following a Russian attack.

“No country other than Russia has ever fired on nuclear power units,” Zelensky said. “This is the first time in our history. In the history of mankind. The terrorist state now resorted to nuclear terror.”

Following the incident, US Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said there was no indication of elevated radiation levels at the Zaporizhzhia plant, which provides more than a fifth of the total electricity generated in Ukraine.

“These are tanks equipped with thermal imagers, so they know where they are shooting,” Zelensky said of the Russian military

“If there is an explosion, it is the end of everything. The end of Europe, he said. “Only immediate European action can stop Russian troops.”

Local officials said, however, that essential equipment at the station was unaffected and radiation levels were normal.

Russia has already taken control of the Chernobyl plant, about 100 km north of Kiev, which has been one of the most radioactive locations on earth since it saw an explosion in its fourth reactor in April 1986.

Financial markets in Asia spiraled out of control as early reports of the incident emerged, with stocks falling and oil prices soaring further.

Meanwhile, Ukraine’s state emergency service said later on Friday that the fire has been put out.