In the Ukrainian president’s weekly address to the nation, Volodymyr Zelensky again condemned Putin’s murderous policy, accusing Moscow of “nuclear terrorism.” According to him, “Russian soldiers are the first in the world to use a nuclear facility for terrorism.”
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Alongside his enormous efforts to put an end to the struggle that has been going on in Ukraine for almost six months, this week Antonio Guterres, the Secretary General of the United Nations, and Raphael Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), came to his aid. , considered the largest nuclear power plant in Europe, the two warned of a catastrophic disaster and called on Russia to immediately stop its heavy shelling in the region.
Although the facility is different and much safer than the one in Chernobyl, a fire in one of the containers where nuclear fuel is stored, damage to their cooling system or a leak of dangerous radioactive materials from them could cause environmental damage in Ukraine and Europe as a whole, which would exceed the largest nuclear-ecological disaster in history that happened in 1986 and claimed thousands of victims.
When they accuse each other of mutual shelling, which could damage the facility in Zaporizhia or its surroundings, the government in Kyiv claims that Russia has large stockpiles of weapons there, and even uses them to attack Ukrainian settlements and military forces. On the other hand, Moscow, which took over it and most of the districts in southeastern Ukraine, condemns the “dangerous provocation” of the Ukrainians. According to her, the government in Kiev is using the nuclear facility to damage the positions and achievements of the Russian army.
All this, while around the world there are growing calls to avoid fighting in the area of the facility and even to make it demilitarized, as well as to allow experts from the IAEA to visit the power plant in order to prevent an escalation in the struggle and a deterioration into a nuclear war.
A nuclear paradox
The Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, established between 1984-1995, is the largest nuclear facility in Europe and the ninth largest in the world. The facility is located on an important geopolitical axis in Eastern Europe and includes six reactors that provided more than 1.23 trillion kilowatts of electricity by December 2021, which is a fifth of Ukraine’s electricity and about half of the amount of energy produced by all four of its nuclear power facilities.
Geographically, the power plant, which is located in the city of Enrhoder in the south of the country and is located on the banks of the Dnieper River, lies about 200 km north of the Crimean peninsula, which was annexed to Russia in 2014, and west of the battle zone in the Donbas region, most of which was recently occupied, as well as about 525 km “m south of Chernobyl. The Chernobyl district is also one of the first destinations that the Russian army banned tourists from visiting about a week before it was taken over in February, right after the invasion of Ukraine.
Although the facility in Zaporizhia has been under the control of the Russian military since the beginning of March, Ukrainian teams are actually responsible for its day-to-day operation, alongside Russian engineers who supervise them. It is not for nothing that reports from the heads of the IAEA describe this as a paradoxical situation that “attracts fire”, literally.
This charged and explosive situation includes power struggles and severe violence between the opposing parties, which is manifested, among other things, in reports that reached the White House regarding the captivity, torture and murder of Ukrainian staff members. The great tension between them is partly related to the operational management of the site, including the production and transmission of electricity throughout Ukraine, as well as the operation and preservation of the enormous amount of nuclear material held there.
This flammable and valuable material requires careful and continuous supervision of the nuclear power plant’s infrastructure, which is essential for its proper operation (such as cooling the reactors and maintaining the integrity of the water fed to them). A visit by experts to the facility on behalf of the IAEA, which was intended to calm the tensions that had arisen, was repeatedly rejected by the Kremlin.
Moreover, the escalating struggle between the Russian army and the Ukrainian forces in the field reflects on the relationship of forces at the facility and intensifies the hostility between them. It impairs the proper management of the power plant, partly due to the delays in the supply chain of spare parts.
playing with fire
The mutual shelling that has recently increased, especially towards the forces operating in and around the facility, is causing enormous damage throughout Ukraine (for example, disconnecting power lines and electricity supply). They increase the threat and potential damage to the power plant, reactors and its critical infrastructures.
Nuclear experts warn that beyond the expected damage from the explosion of the reactor core, there is a fear of actual damage that may be caused to the cooling systems of the fuel pools. There is a danger of uncontrolled heat accumulation, which will cause the reactors to melt and fire, which will release deadly radioactive radiation that could spread throughout the country and the entire continent.
In this regard, reports were published this week by the Ukrainian “Enerjotem” agency regarding the shelling of the Russian army in the vicinity of the power plant and damage, intentional or accidental, near the places where the radioactive materials are stored. Russia, for its part, presents this as an “accident” that could lead to a nuclear disaster – and places full responsibility for it on Ukraine.
Against this background, the voices around the world condemn Putin, who deliberately commits war crimes and uses nuclear terrorism, if only for violating the Geneva Convention and the nuclear safety principles of the IAEA, alongside international agreements limiting the use of nuclear energy.
In a recent interview with Sergey Lavrov, the Russian Foreign Minister warned of a “very significant chance” of a nuclear war breaking out over the Ukraine crisis. From the Kremlin’s point of view, this is a serious and real danger, which should not be underestimated. This is especially so in light of the asymmetry between Russia and the NATO countries, where the Russian conventional inferiority stands out compared to its nuclear superiority. Russia has the largest nuclear weapons stockpile in the world, which includes, among other things, about 6,000 nuclear warheads.
Moreover, for Moscow, nuclear weapons are a critical deterrent in the context of the military confrontation and the psychological struggle it is leading against Ukraine, including against the United States and the West. It uses it as a pressure lever as part of its psychological warfare, combining the sending of media messages aimed at the Biden administration and NATO countries. And with the aim of limiting their military support to the Kyiv government, and erasing Ukrainian cities and towns from the map, the purpose of which is to cause demoralization and damage to the resilience of the Ukrainian public.
If that is not enough, then when there are signs on the ground that the situation is changing to the detriment of the Russian army (such as the shelling of the Russian planes in Crimea), the head of the Kremlin does not skimp on measures and chooses to “play with fire”. He is no longer satisfied with the declarative level and threats to use tactical nuclear weapons or launch supersonic cruise missiles – but takes an extreme step that includes actual damage to the largest nuclear facility in Europe, if only to attract global attention and present an image of victory at any cost.
Even worse, Putin pulls out the “doomsday weapon” and creates a situation of escalation for the sake of escalation, designed to shake the Kyiv government and force it reluctantly to agree to any terms of the ceasefire that Moscow dictates to it. That is why President Zelensky’s call for help is not a false cry. It is time to realize that this is one of the most serious extreme moments in the war in Europe, which is also a low point in Russian policy and international relations.
Undoubtedly, this is extortion, violence and nuclear terrorism of a new, bolder and more dangerous kind, which we have not encountered until today.
The author is an expert on geopolitics, global terrorism and international crises