War in Ukraine | Russia occupies Zaporozhye nuclear power plant, repression intensifies

(Kyiv) The Russian army Friday occupied the largest Ukrainian nuclear power plant, where bombings in the night raised fears of a disaster, on the ninth day of an offensive accompanied by a growing repression of any dissenting voice in Russia.

In the south of the country, the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant, the largest nuclear power plant in Europe, hit overnight by Russian artillery strikes according to the Ukrainians, was the scene of a fire which caused concern.

But at the start of the morning, the Ukrainian regulator indicated that the fire, which had affected a laboratory and a training building, had been extinguished and that no radioactive leak had been detected.

“The territory of the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant is occupied by the armed forces of the Russian Federation. The operational staff controls the energy blocks and ensures their operation in accordance with the requirements of the technical regulations for operating safety,” the regulator said.

Radioactivity levels remain unchanged at the site of the plant, which provides much of the country’s electricity, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has confirmed, saying no “essential” equipment has been removed. been damaged.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has accused Moscow of stirring up “nuclear terror” and wanting to replicate the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, the worst in history in 1986.

“We alert everyone to the fact that no other country apart from Russia has ever fired on nuclear power plants. It is the first time in our history, the first time in the history of Humanity. This terrorist state is now resorting to nuclear terror,” he said.

“Only immediate European action can stop the Russian troops. We must prevent Europe from dying of a nuclear disaster,” he added.

“The attack on a nuclear power plant demonstrates the irresponsible nature of this war and the need to put an end to it”, also declared NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, before an emergency meeting of the Foreign Ministers of the Alliance in Brussels.

Earlier, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson called for another emergency meeting of the UN Security Council, while US President Joe Biden “urged Russia to cease its military activities in the area” of the plant. , according to the White House.

Zaporizhie, located on the Dnieper River about 550 km southeast of Kyiv, is Europe’s largest nuclear power plant with a total capacity of almost 6,000 megawatts, enough to supply electricity to around four million homes. It was inaugurated in 1985, when Ukraine was still part of the Soviet Union.

On February 24, fighting had already taken place near the former Chernobyl power plant, about a hundred kilometers north of Kyiv, which is now in the hands of Russian troops.

The fire at the plant reflects the growing anxiety of Westerners in the face of a conflict that is now engulfing the whole country, with an increasingly long list of bombed cities.

Kyiv notably accused Moscow on Thursday of having bombed a residential area and schools in Cherniguiv, north of Kyiv, killing 33 people. Fighting continued there on Friday, according to the Ukrainians.

The situation had also become “hell” in Okhtyrka, and “critical” in Sumy, two towns some 350 km east of Kyiv, according to local authorities.

As for the strategic port of Mariupol, in the south-east, where the mayor accused Russian forces on Thursday of wanting to establish “a blockade”, the regional authorities indicated that they had “no communication”.

In statements on Russian television Thursday, President Vladimir Putin gave no hope of appeasement.

“The special military operation is going strictly according to schedule, according to plan,” he said. He praised the courage of the Russian soldiers who fight according to “neo-Nazis” and “foreign mercenaries” who use civilians as “human shields” in Ukraine.

Mr Putin wants to “take control” of all of Ukraine, French President Emmanuel Macron said earlier after a 90-minute phone call with Vladimir Putin. “The worst is yet to come,” he added.

New repressive laws

At the same time, the Kremlin is tightening its repression of all dissenting voices in the face of an increasingly deadly conflict.

Since the beginning of the offensive on February 24, arrests, closures of the few remaining independent media and new repressive texts have followed, while the Kremlin and the major Russian media present the conflict as “a special military operation” and banish the word “invasion”.

On Friday, the Russian authorities restricted access to the sites of four independent media: the local edition of the BBC, the German international radio and television station Deutsche Welle, the independent site Meduza and Radio Svoboda, the Russian branch of RFE/RL.

Russian deputies also adopted a text providing for penalties of up to fifteen years in prison for anyone publishing “false information” which would have “serious consequences” for the armed forces.

While the authorities try to resist unprecedented economic sanctions imposed by the West, another text plans to penalize “calls to impose sanctions on Russia”.

Searches were also underway on Friday at the Moscow premises of the emblematic human rights NGO Memorial, the most respected in the country, after its dissolution ordered by justice, Memorial said.

Many Russians try to leave their country. With the suspension of almost all flights connecting Russia to Europe, trains connecting Saint Petersburg to Helsinki arrive crowded in the Finnish capital, noted AFP.

“We decided to return as soon as possible, because we don’t know what the situation will be in a week,” Polina Poliakova, a Muscovite studying in Paris, told AFP on her arrival in Helsinki.

However, these trains are de facto only accessible to Russians who already live or work in Europe: only people with a valid Schengen visa and an anti-COVID-19 vaccine recognized by the European Union pass, in other words not the most administered Sputnik vaccine in Russia.

Humanitarian Corridors

It was not known for the moment whether the “humanitarian corridors”, which Russian and Ukrainian negotiators agreed on Thursday to organize, were being put in place.

These negotiators had found themselves on the border between Poland and Belarus, after a first attempt on Monday, in the hope of obtaining a truce. “Unfortunately, there are not yet the expected results for Ukraine. There is only one solution to organize humanitarian corridors”, lamented after the discussions a member of the Ukrainian delegation, Mikhaïlo Podoliak.

More than a million refugees have already fled the country, according to the UN.

Following his meetings with NATO and EU officials in Brussels on Friday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken was due to visit Poland, where the majority of refugees are arriving, as well as the three Baltic countries and Moldova.

The latter, which fears to be the next target of Moscow, announced Thursday that it has officially submitted its candidacy for entry into the European Union, like Georgia, following the example of Ukraine.