The Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant has been captured by Russian forces, according to an adviser to the Ukrainian President.

Ukraine’s ambassador to the United States, Oksana Markarova, however, said that the Ukrainian National Guard was still working to defend the nuclear plant from Russian forces had attempted to seize control of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, adding .

“They made an attempt to seize the Chernobyl nuclear power station, and the fight is going right there with the Ukrainian National Guard protecting the Chernobyl station from the attack,” Ms Markarova said in a press briefing. “For the first time since the Chernobyl nuclear disaster — after which Ukraine has been protecting, together with our European and American friends and allies, the world from another nuclear disaster — we have to defend it again from the Russian forces.”

Russia’s defence ministry claimed to have “neutralised” Ukraine’s airbases and air defences, destroying 74 military ground facilities, including 11 airfields, three command posts and 18 radar stations for anti-aircraft missile systems. Ukrainian authorities said Russia had carried out 203 attacks and that fighting was raging across almost the entire territory.

Peoples Gazette had reported that Russian soldiers had invaded from Belarus and entered the exclusion zone around Chernobyl. Nuclear safety expert Dmytro Gumenyuk had warned Ukraine’s nuclear power plants would pose a risk of radioactive pollution in Europe if caught in the crossfire of a Russian invasion

If this happens, Mr Gumenyuk said radiation could contaminate air, soil and waterways, affecting not only Ukraine but also Russia and much of Europe. 

Ukraine has 15 nuclear reactors in four power plants, which provide 52 per cent of the country’s electricity: Khelnitsky and Rivne in the northwest, and Zaporizhzhia and the South Ukrainian plantsin the west and south respectively.