The International Atomic Energy Agency is nearing an agreement to guarantee the safety and security of Ukraine’ s nuclear facilities, IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi told European lawmakers on Monday, Politico reported.
"We are negotiating, we are approaching what we want to be the final stages of our consultations," Grossi said, stressing that he hoped to reach a deal "very soon."
He added that the talks, which began on March 10, are "very delicate" diplomatically.
Responding to criticism that a deal could be used by Russia to legitimize control over parts of Ukraine's territory, Grossi insisted that any agreement would make "no political references to the situation in the plants or no connection that could be construed as legitimizing the presence of anybody in a foreign territory."
He added that the deal will require Moscow and Kyiv to "observe some of the rules... that have been repeatedly violated with enormous risk for the population, local, regional, European populations" since Russia's invasion of Ukraine last month.
Grossi said he hopes, once the agreement is reached, to send IAEA experts to Ukraine "to facilitate the situation there, also as a deterrent to new, complicated, dangerous occurrences taking places," Politico reported.
Experts will also look to gather "credible, objective information" about the situation on the ground, he said, noting that it is becoming "increasingly difficult" to ascertain the facts of the situation "because there are conflicting narratives about what is happening."
Grossi said in a tweet that he “requested strong support of the EU" for his plan to “deploy IAEA experts to help maintain safety and security of the sites”
The international community has expressed concern about a potential nuclear disaster and large-scale environmental damage due to the fact that Russian troops have taken control of Ukraine's decommissioned Chernobyl nuclear power plant and the active nuclear power station at Zaporizhzhia.
Despite Grossi himself saying he is worried in general about nuclear safety due to the war, the IAEA has not warned of explicit and immediate danger outside Ukraine.
In addition to emphasizing the fact that targeting nuclear plants would be a breach of international law, Grossi emphasized to European lawmakers that “nuclear power plants are very robust, they can sustain an airplane that falls on them" and that it would take "massive means" to get to the core of a reactor.
Brian Freeman ✉
Brian Freeman, a Newsmax writer based in Israel, has more than three decades writing and editing about culture and politics for newspapers, online and television.
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