The State Duma Council called on the UN and the IAEA to demand that Kyiv stop shelling the ZNPP

The State Duma Council called on the UN and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to demand that Kyiv immediately stop the shelling of the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant, the corresponding message appeared website of the lower house of parliament.

“In its statement, the Council of the State Duma condemns the ongoing shelling by Ukrainian military units of Europe’s largest Zaporozhye nuclear power plant over the past few weeks and calls on the UN and the IAEA to demand from the Ukrainian authorities an immediate cessation of shelling of the ZNPP,” the statement said.

Chairman of the State Duma Vyacheslav Volodin also recalled that over the past 24 hours, the armed forces of Ukraine (AFU) had hit the area of ​​the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant 7 times. Earlier, the head of the Zaporozhye military-civilian administration (VGA), Yevgeny Balitsky, reported 17 strikes directly on the territory of the ZNPP, transmits RIA Novosti agency.

Today, Bloomberg, citing its own diplomatic sources, reported that the IAEA mission wants to visit the Zaporozhye NPP before September 5. During this period, a two-week mission is planned for the first security check of the station in 16 years – the decision to conduct it was made even before the start of a special military operation in Ukraine. According to Bloomberg, the inspectors will have broader powers than previously thought, and as part of the IAEA mission to the nuclear power plant, representatives of security agencies and officials responsible for accounting for nuclear materials at the facility will arrive, which will allow for an examination of the shelling of the plant.

On August 23, an urgent meeting of the UN Security Council was held due to the situation at the ZNPP, during which the Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation to the UN, Vasily Nebenzya, reported on photographic evidence of shelling of the ZNPP by Ukraine distributed by Russia in the Council and the UN General Assembly. He also noted that since the last meeting of the UN Security Council, the situation at the Zaporozhye NPP has deteriorated significantly.

On August 24, President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky, during his speech via video link at a meeting of the UN Security Council, said that the Russian military should leave the territory of the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant, and control over the station should be transferred to the IAEA mission.

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