Ukrainian authorities said they finally managed to get firefighters to the Zaporizhazhia nuclear power plant to put out the fire in one of the units hit by Russian artillery and that plant safety has now been “restored”.
“The director of the plant has assured that nuclear safety is now guaranteed,” Oleksander Starukh, head of the military administration of the Zaporizhazhia region, wrote on Facebook.
The Ukrainian authorities have also denied to the IAEA that there have been increases in the level of radiation around the plant.
Russian forces are “hitting Zaporizhazhia, the largest nuclear power plant in Europe. There are already flames. If it were to explode, it would be 10 times worse than Chernobyl. Russia must immediately cease fire, allow the firefighters “to intervene and” create a safe zone “, Ukrainian foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba tweeted.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said that Russia is resorting to “nuclear terror”hitting a nuclear power plant for the first time in history, and which “wants to repeat the Chernobyl catastrophe. We want to alert the world that no country outside Russia has ever fired on nuclear power plants. It is the first time in ours. history, the first time in the history of mankind. This terrorist state is now resorting to nuclear terror, “Zelensky said in a video released by the Ukrainian presidency.
“I will never go back from my declaration that Russia and Ukraine are one people.” As the Moscow army continues to carpet bomb, laying siege from Chernihiv in the north to Mariupol in the south, Vladimir Putin he speaks again and claims his war against “anti-Russia” created by the West, “which threatens, even with nuclear weapons”. An offensive that, according to the French president Emmanuel Macronwho spoke today with the Kremlin leader, aims to “take control of all of Ukraine”.
But as the tones grow ever more threatening, from the second round of negotiations in the Brest forest, on the border between Belarus and Poland, comes theannouncement of humanitarian corridors for the evacuation of civilians, guaranteed by a temporary ceasefire in the affected areas. According to Kiev, the delivery of food and medicine to the population of the most affected centers will also be allowed. A first, timid sign of openness, in the face of the tragedy of over a million refugees and an entire population at the end, after 8 days of conflict. Talks will resume early next week, again in a secret area in Belarus. But in the meantime, Putin warned, the “special operation” will continue.
“We are achieving our goals and having success,” the Russian president said. The second round of negotiations, conducted by delegations substantially identical to those of the first, meanwhile led to the agreement promised by Moscow on a ‘safe’ way out for civilians from the areas under siege. An agreement that will now be translated into concrete form by the respective defenses. The Russian chief negotiator, Vladimir Medinsky, spoke of “significant progress”, explaining that humanitarian and military issues were discussed, as well as a possible future political solution to the conflict.
“The positions of Russia and Ukraine are clear,” he explained. Zelensky’s adviser, Mykhailo Podoliak, did not go out of balance, stressing that “the desired results” were not achieved, while for the head of the Duma’s foreign commission, Leonid Slutsky, who was also in the talks, “several more” meetings will be needed.
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While waiting for them, however, the situation on the ground is destined to get even heavier, with the threat of a pitched naval battle in Odessa, together with the pounding of missiles on the cities. For a real solution, Zelensky said, a meeting at the highest level would be needed.
“I have to talk to Putin, because it is the only way to stop this war”, said the Ukrainian president, assuring himself that he is “open” and “ready to address all issues”. Which, according to media close to the Kremlin, also concern the status of the self-proclaimed separatist republics of Donetsk and Lugansk in Donbass, where fighting continues unabated. “Sit down with me to negotiate, but not 30 meters” away, was the appeal made to the Russian leader, evoking Putin’s meetings with Macron and Scholz with the provocative flash of the former comedian.
“I don’t bite. What are you afraid of?”, Added the Ukrainian president, increasingly a protagonist in the international media, while according to intelligence he remains the number one target of Moscow’s hitmen. However, the Kremlin leader is unlikely to accept a meeting. As Europe prepares to welcome refugees, the US and the UK announce new sanctions on the oligarchs, and Moldova is also seeking an anchorage in the West by officially presenting its candidacy for EU membership. But it is on the defense of Kiev, Zelensky insisted, that the future of the continent is at stake.
“If Ukraine falls – he warned – Russia will take the Baltic countries and Eastern Europe. If we were to disappear, it will be the turn of Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia. Until the Berlin wall, believe me”.
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/data/photo/2022/03/04/62218c6abb532.jpg?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1 "Pertamina Balikpapan Oil Refinery Burns")