The parameters of a mission of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in Ukraine were agreed upon during the talks on Thursday among Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and UN Secretary-General António Guterres.
Zelenskyy told reporters after the talks in the western Ukrainian city of Lviv that the conditions of a possible IAEA mission to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in southern Ukraine, were agreed upon in a legal way, via territory free from occupiers, stressing that Moscow should immediately withdraw its forces and stop shelling and provocations from the plant.
The calls for an IAEA mission to the plant were prompted by the mounting fears enticed by the increased risk of a Chernobyl-style nuclear disaster and the continuing shelling of the Russian-controlled facility both Kyiv and Moscow have blamed each other for.
They also accused each other of planning to stage a “provocation” at the plant.
Russia, which captured the plant soon after the invasion in February, earlier rejected as unacceptable international calls for a demilitarized zone around the nuclear plant that even Guterres reiterated, saying it could shut it down, which, according to Ukraine, would increase the risk of a catastrophe.
During the talks and the following press conference, the three leaders hailed the successful UN-brokered agreement that has allowed after months of negotiations the passage of grains ships from three Ukrainian Black Sea ports, sending wheat prices tumbling to pre-war levels.
They also discussed using the positive atmosphere created by the grain export deal to establish lasting peace and expedite the exchange of POWs between Ukraine and Russia.
President Zelenskyy appeared visibly frustrated during the crowded news conference that lasted nearly an hour in the heat, visibly slowed by the failing simultaneous translation.
Irked by a translator’s failure to interpret his comments properly into English, Zelenskyy, who prefers to speak Ukrainian in public, acted after the interpreter cut short his remarks and took over the job himself.
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