The IAEA hopes to agree “very, very soon” on a safety zone at the Zaporizhia power plant

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Jan. 18 () –

The director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Rafael Grossi, is confident that “very, very soon” there will be an agreement to create a security zone around the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, located in eastern Ukraine. and considered the largest in Europe.

Grossi is precisely visiting Ukraine, as part of a tour with which he wants to reinforce surveillance of the atomic facilities in full conflict with Russia, which launched a military offensive in February 2022 that continues to this day.

The IAEA has formally installed this Wednesday a permanent mission at the Chernobyl plant, occupied by Russian troops in the early stages of the war. For Grossi, it is “a very important day”, which allows us to move towards “the next phase”, with greater vigilance.

In the case of Chernobyl, the head of the agency has highlighted that the facilities have returned “more or less” to normality and hopes “that there will be no more occupations or attacks”, but does not hide that the situation is different at the Chernobyl Zaporizhia, taken by Russian forces in March last year.

Before traveling to kyiv and meeting with the main Ukrainian authorities, Grossi has insisted that it is “necessary” to protect the Zaporizhia plant, since it is in a “very precarious” situation because it is located near the combat front.

However, he has been optimistic about establishing a security zone around the facility. After the “progress”, he believes that it is time to give “another push” to the initiative, for which he is confident that “very, very soon” there could be some kind of pact.

“It’s not easy,” admitted Grossi, who does not plan to travel to that area on this trip but does not rule out doing so in the future.