It is the second time in as many days that the factory, which is the largest of its kind in Europe, has been affected. Ukraine and Russia traded blame for the two attacks.
The rockets launched on Saturday evening hit near a dry storage facility, where 174 barrels containing spent nuclear fuel are kept, according to Energoatom, Ukraine’s nuclear power company. Explosions blew out windows in parts of the plant and a worker was hospitalized with injuries from shrapnel.
“Apparently they were specifically targeting containers with treated fuel, which are stored outside next to the bombing site,” the company said in a statement on Telegram.
Three radiation monitoring detectors were also damaged on Saturday, making “rapid detection and response in the event of a worsening radiological situation or leakage of radiation from spent nuclear fuel drums is currently impossible”, Energoatom said.
“This time, a nuclear disaster has been miraculously averted, but miracles cannot last forever,” he added.
Kyiv has accused Russian forces of stockpiling heavy weapons and launching attacks from the factory, which they retook in early March and still occupy. Moscow, meanwhile, claimed Ukrainian troops were targeting the compound.
The head of the pro-Russian regional administration of Zaporizhzhia, Yevgeny Balitsky, said in a statement on Telegram on Sunday that Ukrainian forces had targeted the spent fuel storage area and damaged administrative buildings.
Fears over the safety of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant have grown since Russian forces seized the site, but reached an inflection point on Friday when shelling damaged a high-voltage power line and forced one of the plant reactors to stop working, despite the absence of radioactive leaks. being detected.
After the attack, Energoatom said Russian shellfire damaged a nitrogen-oxygen station and the combined auxiliary building, and that there were “still risks of hydrogen leakage and spraying of radioactive substances, and the risk of fire is also high”.
The Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Rafael Mariano Grossi, said he was alarmed by reports of damage and demanded that a team of IAEA experts be authorized to urgently to visit the plant, to assess and safeguard the complex.
“I am extremely concerned by yesterday’s bombing of Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, which underscores the very real risk of a nuclear disaster that could threaten public health and the environment in Ukraine and beyond,” Grossi said in a statement Saturday.
“Military action jeopardizing the safety and security of the Zaporizhzya nuclear power plant is totally unacceptable and must be avoided at all costs,” he added.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who has accused Russia of using the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant to sow terror in Europe, said on Sunday he had spoken with European Council President Charles Michel about the situation in the complex.
“Russian nuclear terror requires a stronger response from the international community – sanctions against the Russian nuclear industry and nuclear fuel,” Zelensky tweeted.
CNN was unable to verify claims of damage to the plant, which sits on the banks of the Dnipro River. Ukrainian prosecutors have opened an investigation into the bombing.
“Irresponsible violation of nuclear safety rules”
The head of European Union diplomacy criticized Russian military activities around the Zaporizhzya power plant and called on the IAEA to gain access to the complex.
Several Western and Ukrainian officials believe Russia is now using the giant nuclear facility as a stronghold to protect its troops and launch attacks, as they assume Kyiv will not retaliate and risk a crisis.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has accused Moscow of using the plant to protect its forces, while the UK Ministry of Defense said in a recent security assessment that Russia’s actions at the complex were sabotaging the security of its operations.
The Ukrainian mayor of Enerhodar, Dmytro Orlov, said in late July that Russian forces had been observed using heavy weapons near the plant because “they know very well that the Ukrainian armed forces will not respond to these attacks, because they can damage the nuclear power plant”. plant.”
“The possible consequences of an impact on an operating reactor are equivalent to the use of an atomic bomb,” the ministry said on Twitter.
Grossi called on all parties to “show the utmost restraint near this important nuclear facility, with its six reactors”.
Although the security situation is stable and there is no immediate threat to nuclear safety, according to the IAEA, Grossi warned of the serious risk that further fighting at the site could pose. .
“Any military firepower directed at or from the facility would be tantamount to playing with fire, with potentially catastrophic consequences,” Grossi said.
The IAEA has tried to coordinate a mission of safeguards experts to visit the plant since it was seized by Russian forces.
“This mission would play a crucial role in helping to stabilize the nuclear safety and security situation there, as we have done at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant and elsewhere in Ukraine in recent months,” he said. he declares.
CNN’s Mariya Knight, Vasco Cotovio and Tim Lister contributed to this report.
