The Ministry of Defense of Russia and the Armed Forces of Ukraine with Energoatom of Ukraine directly accuse each other of nuclear terrorism. As stated in the Russian military department, Ukrainian military formations continue to strike at the territory of the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant, which could lead to a humanitarian catastrophe.

According to the Russian Defense Ministry, on August 7, at 12:40, Ukrainian artillery attacked the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant. The shelling was carried out from the area of ​​​​the settlement of Marganets on the opposite bank of the Kakhovka reservoir. As a result, a high-voltage power line was damaged, a power surge occurred at the nuclear power plant, which caused smoke, and the protection system worked, cutting off the power supply.

Fire brigades arrived at the scene and managed to extinguish the fire, but to prevent disruption of the operation of the nuclear power plant, the power of the 5th and 6th power units was reduced.

In turn, Ukraine accuses the Russian military of mining the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant. This was stated by the Ukrainian state company Energoatom, which is the operator of all operating nuclear power plants in Ukraine.

The company's message says that the information about the mining of the nuclear power plant was announced by the commander of the radiation, chemical and biological defense forces of the Russian Federation, Major General Valery Vasiliev, who currently commands the garrison of the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant. According to the company, he also said that the nuclear power plant may have to be blown up.

“We mined all the important facilities of the Zaporozhye NPP. And we do not hide this from the enemy and warned them. The enemy knows that the station will be either Russian or no one's. We are ready for the consequences of this step. And you, the soldiers-liberators, must understand that there is no other way out," Major General told the soldiers at the ZNPP, Energoatom reports.

The Russian Defense Ministry called these allegations fake. According to the department, Major General Valery Vasiliev is not the head of the RCBZ troops, this position is occupied by Lieutenant General Igor Kirillov. Vasiliev himself is now in Uzbekistan, "where preparations are being made for the army games."

The mayor of Energodar Dmitry Orlov said that Vasiliev has been in Ukraine for almost three months and gave orders to strike at Energodar and Melitopol.

Major General Valery Vasiliev is not the head of the RHZB troops, he heads the military Academy of the Radiation and Chemical Protection Troops of the RF Ministry of Defense, which is recorded on the website of the educational institution.

Russia is indeed carrying out mining on the territory of the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant in Energodar, and also stores shells of “different capacity and different power” right in the workshops. Information previously reported by The Insider's sources was confirmed in The Insider's stream by Mykhailo Podolyak, adviser to the head of the Office of the President of Ukraine. At the same time, Ukraine and the Russian Defense Ministry continue to accuse each other of strikes.

According to Podolyak, there is a large contingent on the territory of the station, including artillery. Russia has turned the nuclear power plant into a military facility where safety standards are violated, so there are extreme risks. Podolyak also noted the poor performance of Rosatom:

“There is no team that understands what it is doing and what is happening there. Because the key task was to try to steal something: Russia does this throughout Ukraine. So she wants to reorient the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant in order to supply cheap electricity to the Crimean peninsula and the occupied territories.   And to be able to minimize the costs they incur because of the occupation.”

Podolyak added that Rosatom wants to receive some kind of dividend as part of a short strategy. He urged the international community not to wait "until we get some sort of excess or Chernobyl 2.0" and preventively end the history of Russia at the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant. This requires extremely tough statements by the relevant international institutions, he concluded.

On August 5, Russia fired at the Zaporizhzhya NPP several times from multiple launch rocket systems (MLRS), in total three “arrivals” were recorded at the plant site. At the same time, the pro-Russian authorities of the occupied Energodar accused Ukraine of shelling the ZNPP. The Ukrainian "Energoatom" reported that after the strikes, emergency protection worked, and called what was happening "nuclear terrorism by Russia."

The Insider's sources at the Zaporizhzhya NPP reported suspicious activity of Russian soldiers on the territory of the station. The publication also has a video at its disposal, in which Russian military trucks drive into the territory of the nuclear power plant and unload some kind of cargo. According to this source, the machine room was mined. According to another source, about 500 Russian soldiers and military equipment, including armored personnel carriers, anti-aircraft installations and equipment for radiochemical reconnaissance, are on the territory of the station, and the area around the station is mined by Russian troops.

Energoatom claimed that the Russian military was forcing ZNPP employees to drain the cooling pools. According to the agency, a provocation was being prepared: the Russians intend to accuse Ukrainian nuclear scientists of storing weapons on the territory of the station. To do this, they detained several workers and tortured them to confess that, allegedly, back in March, they dropped some kind of weapon - explosives or shells - into the concrete bowls of the cooling pools at the ZNPP. In July, Andrei Goncharuk, a ZNPP hydroshop diver , died after being tortured by the Russian military, “forcing him to come up with a justification for the need to drain the cooling pools.”