"Regarding the situation at the Chornobyl NPP, the Ukrainian regulator said efforts to repair the damaged power lines were continuing but external electricity supplies remain severed since 9 March. Diesel generators are continuing to provide back-up power to systems relevant for safety, including spent fuel storage facilities at the site of the 1986 accident, and additional fuel deliveries arrived on 11 March, it said," the IAEA said in a Saturday statement.
According to the IAEA, the Director General of Russia’s Rosatom Alexey Likhachev told IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi in a telephone call on Saturday that power lines could be extended from Belarus to supply the Chernobyl NPP. Likhachev also said that power line repair work was underway at the Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant (NPP).
"Likhachev confirmed the site power supply situation and said work was being carried out to restore the lost power lines but in a way not to put at risk the existing supplies, and therefore additional fuel supplies for back-up diesel generators were being brought in, in case they would be needed. He added that other supplies for the plant could also be delivered," the IAEA said.
Russia informed the IAEA that the management and operation of Chernobyl, as well as the Zaporizhzhya NPP, is being carried out by Ukrainian personnel, but a group of Russian experts is also providing assistance.
"...with the consultative assistance of Russian specialists, the restoration of the power supply of the Chernobyl NPP and the physical protection system of the Zaporozhskaya NPP is now being carried out. While implementing measures carried out at ensuring the safe and secure operation of Ukrainian NPPs the Russia side maintains close contact with the IAEA," the Russian side was quoted as saying by the IAEA on Saturday.
Earlier this week, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said that statements coming from Kiev claiming that there was a safety threat from radiation posed by the Chernobyl NPP after it was taken under the control of Russian forces were not true.
Russian Deputy Defense Minister Nikolai Pankov said at a briefing on Wednesday that Ukrainian nationalists had committed an extremely dangerous provocation, attacking the power grid facilities that provide electricity to the Chernobyl NPP, but Russian experts took prompt measures to switch to backup diesel generator power sources.
On March 4, the Russian Defense Ministry said that Kiev attempted a provocation at the Zaporizhzhya the night before and accused Moscow of creating a source of radioactive contamination at the plant. According to the ministry, a group of Russian soldiers were patrolling the area adjacent to the station when a Ukrainian sabotage unit opened fire on them from the windows of several floors of an educational and training complex located outside the NPP. It was suppressed by return fire. The sabotage group set the building ablaze when leaving it. The fire was later extinguished, with radiation level assessed as normal.
In the early hours of February 24, Russia launched a special military operation in Ukraine after the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics (DPR and LPR) appealed for help in defending themselves against the Kiev forces. Russia said that the aim of its special operation is to demilitarize and "denazify" Ukraine and that only military infrastructure is being targeted. Moscow has repeatedly stressed that it has no plans to occupy Ukraine.