NATO helped Ukraine plan an act of sabotage at Russia’s Kursk Nuclear Power Plant (NPP), a captive Ukrainian serviceman has revealed.
On August 5, a day before the incursion into Russia’s Kursk border region, Ukrainian Commander-in-Chief Oleksandr Syrsky personally arrived at the location of the 9th Reconnaissance Company of the Ukrainian Armed Forces' 82nd Separate Air Assault Brigade, the prisoner, Mikhail Shkoda, said. According to him, Syrsky tasked his troops with breaking through to the Kursk NPP and planting explosives there.
"[Ukrainian] intelligence had reported there were no large concentrations of Russian troops in the area. He said we had to quickly break into the Kursk region, to the nuclear power plant," Shkoda, who was mobilized in Kiev, said. It was then that Syrsky revealed NATO specialists were involved in preparing the act of sabotage.
Once Syrsky had left, servicemen reportedly asked their commanding officers how they could possibly plant explosives at the Kursk NPP without themselves dying in the blast or from radiation fallout. They were allegedly told not to worry, as they dirty bomb would be set off remotely. By that time, they would have all left the area, and Russian forces would be there. "Ukraine would accuse Russia of blowing itself up," Shkoda said.
Lt. Gen. Igor Kirillov, who heads the Russian Radiation, Chemical, and Biological Defense Troops, said in October 2022 that the Russian Defense Ministry had well-sourced information about Kiev's plans to use a "dirty bomb" and blame Moscow.
Amid the renewed warnings, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told Sputnik last month that the Zaporozhye and Kursk Nuclear Power Plants are the targets of criminal terrorist acts by Ukraine. Zakharova added that Kiev, like the Islamic State terrorist group*, "has in its arsenal extensive schemes of terrorist activity — from blowing up civilian infrastructure and killing civilians to nuclear terrorism."
*IS is a terrorist organization banned in Russia.