On April 26, 1986, an explosion struck reactor No. 4 at Chernobyl, killing at least 30 people. Countless others died from radiation symptoms in the following years. In late February, during the first week of the war, the factory and the surrounding area fell into the hands of Russian troops. On Thursday, Russian troops announced their intention to withdraw and hand over control to Ukrainian personnel, Energoatom reported. It also published a copy of an official letter allegedly signed by a Russian National Guard spokesman, a representative of the Russian state nuclear company Rosatom and a shift manager at the Chernobyl plant, entitled “The act of acceptance and transfer of of Chernobyl “. The letter states that “the administration of the protected facility makes no claims in relation to the troops of the National Guard of the Russian Federation”. A Telegram statement from Energoatom said a small number of “racists” – a Ukrainian insult to Russians combining the words “fascist” and “racist” – remained at the station. “It should be noted that the information about fortifications and trenches built by the racists in the Red Forest, the most polluted in the whole Exclusion Zone, has also been confirmed,” Energoatom said. “So it is not surprising that the occupiers received significant doses of radiation and panicked at the first sign of illness. And it manifested itself very quickly. As a result, there was almost a riot among the military and they began to gather from there,” the statement continued. CNN could not immediately confirm these allegations. Separately, Energoatom said there were reports that a column of Russian soldiers surrounding the town of Slavutych, which was built to house workers in Chernobyl, was also being formed to withdraw to Belarus. The U.S. also sees Russian forces “withdrawing” from Chernobyl and north and northwest of Kiev, a senior U.S. defense official told reporters Thursday. The United States has said Russian forces may have “abandoned Hostomel Airport”, also known as Antonov International Airport, northwest of Kiev, the official said. The Russian occupation of Chernobyl sparked fears that security standards within the exclusion zone could be jeopardized. One week ago, the Ukrainian government said Russian forces had looted and destroyed a laboratory near an abandoned nuclear power plant used to monitor radioactive waste. Russia is targeting civilian infrastructure such as power stations during its invasion of Ukraine, according to Mason Clark, chief analyst at Russia Institute for War Studies. “This is more clearly happening in Mariupol, where they are very deliberately targeting water stations and power supplies and internet towers and mobile towers and the like, and a very deliberate attempt to make it harder for the defenders to hold out and try to force them to capitulate.” , Clark told CNN in mid-March. CNN’s Ellie Kaufman contributed to this report.
