War in Ukraine: an IAEA team on its way to the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant

Europe 1 with AFP 8:34 a.m., August 31, 2022, modified at 8:35 a.m., August 31, 2022

THE ESSENTIAL

An inspection team from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was on its way Wednesday morning to the nuclear power plant in Zaporizhia (southern Ukraine), the target of bombardments for several weeks.

"We are finally moving after several months (...) of effort. The IAEA is going inside the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant," said the director of the UN agency, Rafael Grossi, to journalists in kyiv, just before leaving.

The plant, the largest in Europe, has been occupied by the Russian army since the beginning of March, after the invasion of Ukraine launched on February 24.

kyiv has accused Moscow of deploying hundreds of troops there and stockpiling ammunition there.

Information to remember:

• An IAEA team is on its way to the Zaporizhia plant

• Gazprom announces that it has "entirely" suspended its gas deliveries to Europe via the Nord Stream gas pipeline

• Volodymyr Zelensky considers the situation "extremely threatening"

• The Ukrainian army continues its counter-offensive in the south

• 1,200 Russian soldiers dead "in one day"

• Senior Russian official planning 'mock' referendum in occupied Ukraine, Washington says

"I am fully aware of the importance of this moment but we are ready. The IAEA is ready. We will report back after our mission. We will spend a few days there", added Rafael Grossi who is leading a team of 13 people.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky received on Tuesday the IAEA experts, who arrived in kyiv on Monday, saying on this occasion that the international community should obtain from Russia "an immediate demilitarization" of the plant.

This, he added, implies "the departure of all Russian soldiers with all their explosives, all their weapons" from this site in southern Ukraine and on which kyiv and Moscow accuse each other of having carried out strikes .

Situation "extremely threatening" according to Zelensky

"Unfortunately Russia does not stop its provocations, precisely in the directions by which the mission must arrive at the central", lamented Volodymyr Zelensky, adding that the situation was "extremely threatening".

"The risk of a nuclear catastrophe due to Russia's actions does not diminish even for an hour," he said.

Oleksandre Staroukh, the regional governor, had spoken in this regard a few hours earlier of missile fire on the city of Zaporijia.

The Zaporizhia power plant, one of the four nuclear power plants operating in Ukraine, has six reactors with a capacity of 1,000 megawatts each.

Last week, it was briefly disconnected from the power grid for the first time in its history, after power lines were damaged.

Nord Stream: gas deliveries "entirely" suspended, announces Gazprom

The Russian giant Gazprom announced on Wednesday that it had "entirely" suspended its gas deliveries to Europe via the Nord Stream gas pipeline due to maintenance work expected to last three days.

Work “planned on a gas compressor station has begun,” the Russian group said in a statement posted on its Telegram account.

Ukrainian counter-offensive

For its part, the Ukrainian army continues its counter-offensive in the south, where intense fighting has been reported.

"Fighting is currently taking place practically on the entire front line: in the south, in the Kharkiv region (northeast) and in the Donbass (east)," President Zelensky said on Tuesday evening.

In Bereznehuvate, a locality 70 kilometers north of Kherson, a southern city taken by the Russians at the start of the war, AFP witnessed a constant passage of Ukrainian armored vehicles, while numerous artillery fire echoed in the surroundings.

Some soldiers were on their way to the front, like this small group waiting for their T74 tank, whose engine was overheating, to be repaired.

“We got them well,” boasted Victor, an infantryman in his sixties, without wanting to say more.

Ukraine's presidency on Tuesday reported "powerful explosions" in the Kherson region as well as the destruction of "a number of Russian ammunition depots" and "all major bridges" that allow vehicles to cross the Dnieper , the river watering this part of Ukraine.

And this in order to cut off supplies from Crimea.

1,200 Russian soldiers dead "in one day"

Russia for its part assured on Monday that it had repelled Ukrainian "offensive attempts" in the Kherson region as well as in that of Mykolaiv, further west.

"Due to the failure of the Ukrainian offensive (...), the enemy suffered heavy losses", or 1,200 men "in one day", as well as dozens of military vehicles, the ministry proclaimed on Tuesday. Russian Defense.

This information was unverifiable from independent sources.

The Russian bombardments have also not ceased on the front line which extends from north to south.

In the center of Kharkiv (northeast), Ukraine's second city, at least five people died in Russian strikes, local authorities said on Tuesday.

And others left two dead and 24 injured in Mykolaiv.

In this context, the Ministers of Defense of the Member States of the European Union agreed on Tuesday, during an informal meeting in Prague, to start the preparatory work for a plan for the training of Ukrainian soldiers by the EU.

In another war waged in parallel, that of gas, a further step was taken on Tuesday towards the drying up of flows from Russia to France with the announcement by Gazprom of the total suspension from Thursday of its deliveries to the Engie group, officially for an unpaid.

Senior Russian official plots 'mock' referendum in occupied Ukraine

A senior Russian official has been tasked with organizing a “mock” referendum to annex Ukrainian territories to Russia, a US State Department spokesman said on Tuesday, saying the vote could take place quickly.

Sergei Kiriyenko, deputy head of the Russian presidential administration and close to Vladimir Putin, oversees efforts to “attempt to annex Ukrainian territories to Russia”, “which, if carried out, would be illegal” , said Vedant Patel during a press briefing.

The White House had already warned on August 24 that Moscow could announce one or more "illegitimate" referendums in occupied Ukraine in the coming weeks.

"The sham referendum will try to give a veneer of legitimacy to an overt land grab that would violate the Ukrainian constitution and international laws," Vedant Patel continued.

“The United States and the international community know the truth, which is that all of Ukraine is and will remain Ukraine,” he added.

The American executive had specified on August 24 that these referendums could take place in Kherson (south), in Zaporijjia, in the separatist regions of Donetsk and Lugansk, as well as in Kharkiv, the second largest city in the country.

Crimea was annexed in March 2014 by Russia after an intervention by Russian special forces and a referendum denounced as illegal by kyiv and the West.