The authorities in Russia have shared images of the Chernobyl exclusion zone, after its troops which invaded Ukraine on Thursday, captured and took control of the plant.
According to the report by AFP, Russia on Saturday released the propaganda images taken in the Chernobyl exclusion zone, the capture of which by the Moscow army, on the first day of the invasion of Ukraine, aroused concern.
After fighting against Ukrainian forces, Russian troops took control of the plant on Thursday, at the heart of a serious nuclear accident in 1986 and whose site remains heavily contaminated.
A video released Saturday by the Russian Ministry of Defense shows soldiers patrolling near the plant, not far from a stationary tank. A masked soldier says the radiation levels are “under control”, assuring that “the protection of the area is carried out (jointly) with the Ukrainian national guard and the civilian personnel who work here”.
The Ukrainian government had previously said that the staff at the plant had been evacuated, AFP reports.
The report by AFP also reported that on Friday, the Ukrainian authorities announced that they had noted an increase in radiation at Chernobyl, but the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) considered that the measured values presented “no danger to the public”.
Experts have speculated that a rise in radioactivity caused by the military bustle may have turned the earth and stirred up contaminated dust.
The worst nuclear accident in history took place on April 26, 1986 in Ukraine, then one of the fifteen Soviet republics, when a reactor of this plant, located about a hundred kilometres from the capital Kiev, exploded, contaminating up to three-quarters of Europe, especially Ukraine, Russia and the territory of present-day Belarus.
Nearly 350,000 people had to be evacuated from a perimeter of 30 kilometres around the plant. The human toll remains controversial.