Russia Accuses Ukraine of Plotting to Blow Up Nuclear Reactor in False Flag Op

Russia has levied jarring accusations at Ukraine, accusing its neighbor of seeking to blow up a nuclear reactor and trying to pin the blame on Russia, according to Russian state media TASS.

Military officials in Russia claim foreign journalists arrived in Kharkiv on Sunday to “register the consequences of the provocation” and that Ukraine planned to accuse Russia falsely of launching projectiles at the reactor, TASS reported.

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“The Security Forces of Ukraine along with the militants of the Azov battalion are plotting a provocation with possible radioactive contamination of the area near the city of Kharkov. Nationalists mined a reactor at an experimental nuclear system located at the [National Research Center of] Kharkov Institute of Physics and Technology. The Ukrainian military and the Azov battalion militants are planning to blow up the reactor and accuse the Russian Armed Forces of allegedly launching a missile strike on an experimental nuclear system,” Russia’s Defense Ministry said in a statement to TASS.

Russia also recently accused Ukraine of attempting to develop a “plutonium-based dirty bomb nuclear weapon” at Chernobyl, Reuters reported. Chernobyl was subject to one of the worst known nuclear disasters in history during its 1986 meltdown. Ukraine shut down the last of the reactors at the site in 2000 and has since constructed a confinement structure over the reactor. A group of scientists maintained the facility until Russian forces took over during its invasion, according to Reuters.

The war in Ukraine has sparked renewed concerns about nuclear proliferation as tensions between Russia and nuclear-armed nations such as the United States deteriorate to post-Cold War lows. In February, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered Russia’s nuclear deterrent be put on high alert amid the war in Ukraine.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky raised alarms last week about a Russian military operation near a nuclear power plant in Zaporizhzhia. Russia seemingly sought to take control of the facility, which could help it cut off power to parts of Ukraine. Zelensky said the shelling of the facility had the potential to create a catastrophe that could threaten all of Europe. Russian forces ultimately captured the facility, NPR reported.

Ukraine briefly held the third-largest stockpiles of nuclear weapons in the world following the collapse of the Soviet Union before signing the Budapest Memorandum. Though the weapons were stored in Ukraine, Russia maintained the launch controls of the nuclear weapons during that brief time, according to the U.S. Defense Threat Reduction Agency. Ukraine agreed to give up the weapons in exchange for debt relief and a security guarantee from the U.S., Russia, and the United Kingdom.

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Last week, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov accused Ukraine of trying to “acquire their own nuclear weapons.” International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafael Grossi cast doubt on those claims.

“The issue for us, it’s very clear. We do not have any information that would question the nonproliferation credentials of Ukraine,” he told the Wall Street Journal. “We do not have any information that there is any deviation of material, any undeclared material or activities leading to the development of nuclear weapons.”