Following the drone attack on the crippled Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine, the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Rafael Grossi, believes that Russia may be attempting to create panic. “They have nuclear material there” Grossi said in an interview with RTL and ntv at the Munich Security Conference. “I assume it’s an attempt to create panic, possibly through the possibility of radioactive release into the atmosphere.”
Grossi described the attack as a “drone with a conventional explosive payload that hit the roof of the safety container, the sarcophagus, covering the affected unit.” Fortunately, there were no significant structural damages and no radiation leaked out, he added.
The IAEA Director General has repeatedly warned that nuclear facilities “should never, under any circumstances, be targeted or put in the crosshairs.” “This has happened today. It happened at the same time in Zaporizhzhia, where we also have our inspectors and experts and we hope to move into the next phase of this conflict without active combat, without a nuclear accident” Grossi said.