MOSCOW: Russia accused Ukraine on Friday of trying to attack the Kursk nuclear power station overnight in what it called an act of “nuclear terrorism,” days before the head of the UN atomic watchdog is due to visit the site.
The Ukrainian defense ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the allegation, the second that Moscow has made in two days. The nuclear plant is located in the Kursk region of western Russia, where fierce fighting has raged since Ukrainian forces launched a surprise incursion on Aug. 6, hitting back as Russian troops advance in eastern Ukraine.
The Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement that its air defense units had shot down three Ukrainian drones overnight in the Kursk region and spoke of thwarting a Ukrainian attempt to carry out “a terrorist attack” against Russian facilities.
Russian state news agency TASS quoted an unnamed source as saying a drone had been shot down near a storage facility for spent nuclear fuel at the Kursk power plant. Reuters could not independently confirm details of the alleged incident.
TASS quoted Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova as saying it was an “act of nuclear terrorism” that required an immediate response from the UN watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency.
The head of the IAEA, Rafael Grossi, is due to visit the power station next week. He has appealed for maximum restraint to avoid a nuclear accident.
Russian President Vladimir Putin accused Ukraine on Thursday of trying to attack the facility, and said Moscow had informed the IAEA. He did provided no details or evidence of a Ukrainian attack.
Ukraine’s Aug. 6 incursion into Kursk, in which thousands of Ukrainian troops punched through Russia’s border, is the biggest into Russia by a foreign power since World War Two and Moscow was caught by surprise.
Kyiv has said it has carved out a buffer zone from an area that Russia, which sent tens of thousands of troops into Ukraine in 2022, has used to pound targets in Ukraine.
Fighting around 30km from the nuclear plant has raged since then as Russian troops battle to dislodge the Ukrainian soldiers who have sought to consolidate and expand the territory they control.
The plant has four reactors, of which two are operational. Construction of two more reactors began in 2018.
Russian state nuclear firm Rosenergoatom said on Friday that unit number 4 at the plant would be disconnected from the grid on Sunday for what it called “scheduled preventive maintenance” lasting 59 days. It said the work would involve modernization and extending the service life of equipment.
Russia accuses Ukraine of trying to attack Kursk nuclear power plant with drone
https://arab.news/m7nda
Russia accuses Ukraine of trying to attack Kursk nuclear power plant with drone
- Russian air defense units had shot down three Ukrainian drones overnight in the Kursk region
- A drone had been shot down near a storage facility for spent nuclear fuel at the Kursk power plant
Venezuela says oil exports continue normally despite Trump blockade
- Trump warned “Venezuela is completely surrounded by the largest Armada ever assembled in the History of South America”
- Oil prices surged in early trading Wednesday in London on news of the blockade, which comes a week after US troops seized a sanctioned oil tanker
CARACAS: Venezuela struck a defiant note Wednesday, insisting that its crude oil exports were not impacted by US President Donald Trump’s announcement of a potentially crippling blockade.
Trump’s declaration on Tuesday marked a new escalation in his months-long campaign of military and economic pressure on Venezuela’s leftist authoritarian President Nicolas Maduro.
Venezuela, which has the world’s largest proven oil reserves, shrugged off the threat of more pain, insisting that it was proceeding with business as usual.
“Export operations for crude and byproducts continue normally. Oil tankers linked to PDVSA operations continue to sail with full security,” state oil company Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA) said.
Trump said Tuesday he was imposing “A TOTAL AND COMPLETE BLOCKADE OF ALL SANCTIONED OIL TANKERS going into, and out of, Venezuela.”
Referring to the heavy US military presence in the Caribbean — including the world’s largest aircraft carrier — he warned “Venezuela is completely surrounded by the largest Armada ever assembled in the History of South America.”
Oil prices surged in early trading Wednesday in London on news of the blockade, which comes a week after US troops seized a sanctioned oil tanker that had just left Venezuela with over 1 million barrels of crude.
Maduro held telephone talks with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to discuss what he called the “escalation of threats” from Washington and their “implications for regional peace.”
Guterres’s spokesman said the UN chief was working to avoid “further escalation.”
- ‘We are not intimidated’ -
Venezuela’s economy, which has been in freefall over the last decade of increasingly hard-line rule by Maduro, relies heavily on petroleum exports.
Trump’s campaign appears aimed at undermining domestic support for Maduro but the Venezuelan military said Wednesday it was “not intimidated” by the threats.
The foreign minister of China, the main market for Venezuelan oil, defended Caracas in a phone call with his Venezuelan counterpart Yvan Gi against the US “bullying.”
“China opposes all unilateral bullying and supports all countries in defending their sovereignty and national dignity,” he said.
Last week’s seizure of the M/T Skipper, in a dramatic raid involving US forces rappelling from a helicopter, marked a shift in Trump’s offensive against Maduro.
In August, the US leader ordered the biggest military deployment in the Caribbean Sea since the 1989 US invasion of Panama — purportedly to combat drug trafficking, but taking particular aim at Venezuela, a minnow in the global drug trade.
US strikes on alleged drug-smuggling boats in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific have left at least 95 people dead since.
Caracas believes that the anti-narcotics operations are a cover for a bid to topple Maduro and steal Venezuelan oil.
The escalating tensions have raised fears of a potential US intervention to dislodge Maduro.
Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum waded into the dispute on Wednesday, declaring that the United Nations was “nowhere to be seen” and asked that it step up to “prevent any bloodshed.”
- Oil lifeline -
The US blockade threatens major pain for Venezuela’s crumbling economy.
Venezuela has been under a US oil embargo since 2019, forcing it to sell its production on the black market at significantly lower prices, primarily to Asian countries.
The country produces one million barrels of oil per day, down from more than three million in the early 2000s.
Capital Economics analysts predicted that the blockade “would cut off a key lifeline for Venezuela’s economy” in the short term.
“The medium-term impact will hinge largely on how tensions with the US evolve — and what the US administration’s goals are in Venezuela.”
