Ukraine Nuclear Plant Runs on Emergency Diesel After Power Loss

The Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine has been without external electricity for over a week and is now running on emergency diesel generators, the UN’s nuclear watchdog said. The plant, which needs power to cool its six non-operating reactors, has only a 10-day diesel supply on site, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). “The availability of diesel fuel is of paramount importance whenever a nuclear power plant loses off-site power,” said IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi. “The current situation once again shows why reliable external power and secure supply routes are indispensable for nuclear safety and security.” The plant received diesel on Thursday and Friday from another off-site location, the IAEA added. Zaporizhzhia lost its regular power supply “following military activity on the northern side of the Dnipro River,” the statement said. The IAEA is trying to negotiate a local ceasefire to allow repairs to electrical lines. The plant, in southern Ukraine, was seized by the Russian army in March 2022, and its reactors have been shut down since that year. In a separate development, Germany is reportedly preparing to blame Russia for an attempted drone attack at Leipzig airport and impose sanctions on Russian entities. Friedrich Merz’s government is expected to announce the measures in the next week, potentially alongside a new EU sanctions package, according to Politico. Ukrainian prosecutors have opened an investigation into why munitions were stored so close to homes after a deadly Russian attack on a warehouse near Kyiv’s western suburbs. At least 37 people were killed in the attack on the warehouse in Myla on Friday, making it the war’s deadliest attack this year. The attack damaged at least 50 residential buildings, including a care home for elderly and disabled people, and sparked a huge fire and explosions in the Bucha district of the Kyiv region. Regional Governor Tymur Tkachenko said 42 more people, including four children, were injured in the strike. The warehouse was a depot owned by the Ukrainian military and stored shells, drones, and other munitions, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a video address. “The first impact was on a place where ammunition was being stored that absolutely should not have been there – a depot of the defence forces. [There was] detonation of shells, mines, other munitions and drones on a significant scale,” he said. Finland’s President Alexander Stubb said he did not believe Russia would risk an attack against a NATO country, telling the Bild newspaper that it would “make no sense” to test the resolve of the alliance. “I simply see neither evidence nor facts to support it,” he said, adding that he did not believe Russia “would ever want to attack NATO, the world’s most powerful military alliance.” Stubb, whose country joined NATO in 2023, said the alliance had to be prepared for any scenario but did not believe Moscow was in a position to go to war with NATO. “It makes no sense for any power in the world to test the resolve of this alliance.”