Vice Prime Minister Iryna Vereshchuk took part in a preparatory meeting of the interdepartmental crisis center.

Energy Minister Herman Halushchenko chaired the event. The meeting was also attended by Ruslan Strilets, Minister of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources, Petro Kotin, President of Energoatom, Oleh Korikov, Head of the State Nuclear Regulatory Inspectorate of Ukraine, representatives of the State Emergency Service and the military administrations of the Zaporizhia, Dnipro, Mykolaiv, and Kherson regions.

The main purpose of the Center’s work is to analyze information on the situation in the ZNPP, which was seized by the Russian occupiers, to model various scenarios and to respond to them in the event of a possible terrorist attack.

To react quickly, the center receives data from sensors used by Energoatom, the State Emergency Service, and the State Nuclear Safety Inspectorate.  There are also four IAEA experts at the station. They must take an active role in reporting and monitoring the situation.

The meeting noted that one of the units is currently operating in a “hot shutdown” mode. The occupiers are deliberately blocking its transition to “cold shutdown” mode. This greatly increases the risk of a terrorist attack on a nuclear facility.

Instead, all emergency services are prepared for possible developments. Joint action protocols have been developed.

To practice them in detail, the Emergency Operations Center decided to conduct large-scale exercises involving central, regional, and local services.