IAEA warns that attacks on a nuclear plant in Russian-controlled Ukraine put the world at risk

International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Rafael Grossi speaks during an interview with Reuters in Tokyo, Japan, March 12, 2024. (REUTERS)
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Updated 16 April 2024
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IAEA warns that attacks on a nuclear plant in Russian-controlled Ukraine put the world at risk

  • Fears of a nuclear catastrophe have been at the forefront since Russian troops occupied the plant shortly after invading in February 2022

UNITED NATIONS: Russia and Ukraine on Monday traded blame before the United Nations Security Council for the attacks on Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, which the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency said have put the world “dangerously close to a nuclear accident.”
Without attributing blame, IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said his agency has been able to confirm three attacks against the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant since April 7.
“These reckless attacks must cease immediately,” he told the Security Council. “Though, fortunately, they have not led to a radiological incident this time, they significantly increase the risk … where nuclear safety is already compromised.”
The remote-controlled nature of the drones that have attacked the plant means that it is impossible to definitively determine who launched them, Grossi told reporters after the meeting.
“In order to say something like that, we must have proof,” he said. “These attacks have been performed with a multitude of drones.”
Zaporizhzhia sits in Russian-controlled territory in southeastern Ukraine and has six nuclear reactors.
Fears of a nuclear catastrophe have been at the forefront since Russian troops occupied the plant shortly after invading in February 2022. Continued fighting between Russian and Ukrainian forces — as well as the tense supply situation at the plant — have raised the specter of a disaster.
Ukraine and its allies on Monday again blamed Russia for dangers at the site, with the United States saying, “Russia does not care about these risks.”
“If it did, it would not continue to forcibly control the plant,” US deputy ambassador Robert Wood told the Security Council, which met at the initiative of the US and Slovenia.
Russia, for its part, said Ukraine was to blame for the attacks.
“The IAEA’s report does not pinpoint which side is behind the attacks,” Russia’s UN Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said. “We know full well who it is.”
“Over the last few months, such attacks not only resumed,” Nebenzia said, “they significantly intensified.”
Ukraine’s ambassador to the UN, Sergiy Kyslytsya, called the attacks “a well-planned false flag operation by the Russian Federation,” which he alleged Russia had designed to distract the world from its invasion of its neighbor.
The Zaporizhzhia facility is one of the 10 biggest nuclear plants in the world. Fighting in the southern part of Ukraine where it is located has raised the specter of a potential nuclear disaster like the one at Chernobyl in 1986, where a reactor exploded and blew deadly radiation across a vast area.
Neither Russia nor Ukraine in recent months has been able to make significant advances along the 1,000-kilometer (620-mile) front line crossing eastern and southern Ukraine. Drones, artillery and missiles have featured heavily in what has become a war of attrition.
Russia and Ukraine have frequently traded accusations over the Zaporizhzhia plant.
The most recent strikes did not compromise the facility, which is designed to withstand a commercial airliner crashing into it, the IAEA said.
The plant’s six reactors have been shut down for months, but it still needs power and qualified staff to operate crucial cooling systems and other safety features.

 


On the front lines in eastern Ukraine, peace feels far away

Updated 5 sec ago
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On the front lines in eastern Ukraine, peace feels far away

DONETSK REGION: In a dugout where each nearby blast sends dirt raining from the ceiling and the black plastic lining the walls slipping down, Ukrainian soldiers say peace talks feel distant and unlikely to end the war. Explosions from Russian weapons — from glide bombs to artillery shells — thunder regularly overhead, keeping them underground except when they fire the M777 howitzer buried near their trench.
Nothing on the Eastern Front suggests the war could end soon.
Diplomatic peace efforts feel so far removed from the battlefield that many soldiers doubt they can bring results. Their skepticism is rooted in months of what they see as broken US promises to end the war quickly.
Recent suggestions by US President Donald Trump that there will be some ” swapping of territories” — as well as media reports that it would involve Ukrainian troops leaving the Donetsk region where they have fought for years defending every inch of land — have stirred confusion and rejection among the soldiers.
Few believe the current talks can end the war. More likely, they say, is a brief pause in hostilities before Russia resumes the assault with greater force.
“At minimum, the result would be to stop active fighting — that would be the first sign of some kind of settlement,” said soldier Dmytro Loviniukov of the 148th Brigade. “Right now, that’s not happening. And while these talks are taking place, they (the Russians) are only strengthening their positions on the front line.”
Long war, no relief
On one artillery position, talk often turns to home. Many Ukrainian soldiers joined the army in the first days of the full-scale invasion, leaving behind civilian jobs. Some thought they would serve only briefly. Others didn’t think about the future at all — because at that moment, it didn’t exist.
In the years since, many have been killed. Those who survived are in their fourth year of a grueling war, far removed from the civilian lives they once knew. With mobilization faltering and the war dragging on far longer than expected, there is no one to replace them as the Ukrainian army struggles with recruiting new people.
The army cannot also demobilize those who serve without risking the collapse of the front.
That is why soldiers wait for even the possibility of a pause in hostilities. When direct talks between Russia and Ukraine were held in Istanbul in May, the soldiers from 148th brigade read the news with cautious hope, said a soldier with the call sign Bronson, who once worked as a tattoo artist.
Months later, hope has been replaced with dark humor. On the eve of a deadline that US President Donald Trump reportedly gave Russia’s Vladimir Putin — one that has since vanished from the agenda amid talk of a meeting in Alaska — the Russian fire roared every minute for hours. Soldiers joked that the shelling was because the deadline was “running out.”
“We are on our land. We have no way back,” said the commander of the artillery group, Dmytro Loviniukov. “We stand here because there is no choice. No one else will come here to defend us.”
Training for what’s ahead
Dozens of kilometers from Zaporizhzhia region, north to the Donetsk area, heavy fighting grinds on toward Pokrovsk — now the epicenter of fighting.
Once home to about 60,000 people, the city has been under sustained Russian assault for months. The Russians have formed a pocket around Pokrovsk, though Ukrainian troops still hold the city and street fighting has yet to begin. Reports of Russian saboteurs entering the city started to appear almost daily, but the military says those groups have been neutralized.
Ukrainian soldiers of the Spartan brigade push through drills with full intensity, honing their skills for the battlefield in the Pokrovsk area.
Everything at the training range, only 45 kilometers (28 miles) from the front, is designed to mirror real combat conditions — even the terrain. A thin strip of forest breaks up the vast fields of blooming sunflowers stretching into the distance until the next tree line appears.
One of the soldiers training there is a 35-year-old with the call sign Komrad, who joined the military only recently. He says he has no illusions that the war will end soon.
“My motivation is that there is simply no way back,” he said. “If you are in the military, you have to fight. If we’re here, we need to cover our brothers in arms.”
Truce doesn’t mean peace
For Serhii Filimonov, commander of the “Da Vinci Wolves” battalion of the 59th brigade, the war’s end is nowhere in sight, and current news doesn’t influence the ongoing struggle to find enough resources to equip the unit that is fighting around Pokrovsk.
“We are preparing for a long war. We have no illusions that Russia will stop,” he said, speaking at his field command post. “There may be a ceasefire, but there will be no peace.”
Filimonov dismisses recent talk of exchanging territory or signing agreements as temporary fixes at best.
“Russia will not abandon its goal of capturing all of Ukraine,” he said. “They will attack again. The big question is what security guarantees we get — and how we hit pause.”
A soldier with the call sign Mirche from the 68th brigade said that whenever there is a new round of talks, the hostilities intensify around Pokrovsk — Russia’s key priority during this summer’s campaign.
Whenever peace talks begin, “things on the front get terrifying,” he said.

Leaders of Indonesia and Peru hold talks on trade and economic ties

Updated 5 min 24 sec ago
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Leaders of Indonesia and Peru hold talks on trade and economic ties

  • Peruvian President Dina Boluarte has met his Indonesian counterpart, Prabowo Subianto, on Monday on a visit aimed at strengthening economic ties as the two countries look to expand into new markets am
  • The two-day visit is expected to deepen Peru’s ties with Indonesia, after the two nations concluded negotiations which began in May on a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement

JAKARTA: Peruvian President Dina Boluarte met his Indonesian counterpart Prabowo Subianto on Monday during a visit aimed at strengthening economic ties as the two countries for new markets amid geopolitical challenges and rising trade barriers.
The signing came just four days after the US President Donald Trump began imposing higher import taxes on dozens of countries on Thursday, including a 19 percent rate on Indonesia. Imports from Peru are paying the 10 percent baseline rate Trump set in April.
Boluarte arrived in Indonesia’s capital of Jakarta on Sunday afternoon, following an invitation President Prabowo extended when the two leaders met at the APEC Summit in Peru in November 2024.
The two-day visit is aimed at deepening Peru’s ties with Indonesia, Southeast Asia’s largest economy, after the two nations concluded negotiations which began in May on a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement or CEPA.
Subianto hosted Boluarte with a ceremony at Merdeka palace in Jakarta before the two leaders lead a closed-door bilateral meeting.
The two leaders are expected to witness the signing of CEPA that could be a major booster to bilateral trade, said Indonesia’s trade minister Budi Santoso ahead of the visit.
“The CEPA deal with Peru is a potential gateway for Indonesian goods and services to enter markets in Central and South America,” Santoso said, “We hope the deal can strengthen Indonesia’s trade presence in the region.”
His ministry’s data showed the country’s total trade with Peru went down from $554.2 million in 2022 to $444.4 million the following year, while Indonesia enjoyed a $290.4 million trade surplus in 2023, driven by major exports including vehicles, footwear and biodiesel.
Indonesia is currently seeking membership of the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, which Peru is part of, to boost export growth.


Philippines’ Marcos says China ‘misinterpreted’ his comments on Taiwan

Updated 15 min 36 sec ago
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Philippines’ Marcos says China ‘misinterpreted’ his comments on Taiwan

  • Philippine leader: ‘War over Taiwan will drag the Philippines kicking and screaming into the conflict. That is what I was trying to say’
  • Over a hundred thousand Filipinos live and work in Taiwan, according to Philippine government data

MANILA: Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. said on Monday that Beijing has “misinterpreted” his comments saying Manila will be inevitably drawn in to a conflict between China and Taiwan should one erupt.

China accused Marcos of “playing with fire” after the Philippine leader said during a visit to India that “there is no way that the Philippines can stay out of it” due to its proximity to the democratically governed island.

“We are, I think for propaganda purposes, misinterpreted,” Marcos told a press briefing.

“I’m a little bit perplexed why it would be characterized as such, as playing with fire,” he added.

Marcos said Filipinos working and living in Taiwan will have to be evacuated if a conflict does arise but maintained that he wishes to avoid confrontation and war.

Over a hundred thousand Filipinos live and work in Taiwan, according to Philippine government data.

“War over Taiwan will drag the Philippines kicking and screaming into the conflict. That is what I was trying to say,” Marcos said.

Marcos’ comments come at a time of heightened tensions between Manila and Beijing over territorial disputes in the South China Sea, a strategic waterway where the two countries have had a series of maritime run-ins over the past years.

On Monday, a Philippine vessel transporting provisions to Filipino fishermen in the Scarborough Shoal was sprayed at with a water cannon by a Chinese coast guard ship, the Philippine Coast Guard said. The vessel managed to evade being hit.

China’s embassy in Manila did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the president’s remarks.

Responding to the Monday incident, China’s coast guard said it had taken necessary measures to expel Philippine vessels from Scarborough Shoal, which China claims as its own territory.

It described the operation as “professional, standardized, legitimate and legal.”

A 2016 ruling of an international arbitral tribunal voided Beijing’s sweeping claims in the region, saying they had no basis under international law, a decision China rejects.


North Korea warns of ‘resolute counteraction’ over US-South Korea drills

Updated 14 min 11 sec ago
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North Korea warns of ‘resolute counteraction’ over US-South Korea drills

  • The warning comes as Seoul and Washington are set to carry out their annual Ulchi Freedom Shield exercises, aimed at containing the nuclear-armed North, from August 18 to 21

SEOUL: North Korea will react with “resolute counteraction” in the event of provocations from upcoming joint military drills between South Korea and the United States, its defense chief said Monday in a state media dispatch.
The warning comes as Seoul and Washington are set to carry out their annual Ulchi Freedom Shield exercises, aimed at containing the nuclear-armed North, from August 18 to 21.
North Korea — which attacked its neighbor in 1950, triggering the Korean War — has always been infuriated by US-South Korean military drills, decrying them as rehearsals for invasion.
“The armed forces of the DPRK will cope with the war drills of the US and (South Korea) with thoroughgoing and resolute counteraction posture... at the level of the right to self-defense,” North Korean defense chief No Kwang Chol said in a statement carried by the Korean Central News Agency.
The US stations around 28,500 troops in South Korea, and the allies regularly stage joint drills they describe as defensive in nature.
Seoul and Pyongyang have recently appeared to be heading toward a thaw in relations, with the two sides removing propaganda loudspeakers along the border.
Seoul has said North Korean troops have begun dismantling propaganda loudspeakers used to blare unsettling noises along the border, days after Seoul’s new administration dismantled its own.
The two countries had already halted propaganda broadcasts along the demilitarised zone, Seoul’s military said in June, after the election of President Lee Jae Myung, who is seeking to ease tensions with Pyongyang.
Relations between the two Koreas had been at one of their lowest points in years under former president Yoon Suk Yeol, with Seoul taking a hard line toward Pyongyang, which has drawn ever closer to Moscow in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Lee has taken a different approach to dealing with the North since his June election, including requesting civic groups cease sending propaganda leaflets over the border by balloon.


Heavy rains in southern Japan cause flooding and mudslides, and leave several people missing

Updated 11 August 2025
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Heavy rains in southern Japan cause flooding and mudslides, and leave several people missing

  • The torrential rain that began late last week left one person missing and four others injured in the southern prefecture of Kagoshima
  • Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba said his government was supporting search and rescue operations for the missing and helping others in affected areas

TOKYO: Downpours on Japan’s southern main island of Kyushu caused flooding and mudslides, injuring a number of people and impacting travel during a Buddhist holiday week. Several people were reported missing.
The torrential rain that began late last week left one person missing and four others injured in the southern prefecture of Kagoshima. The low-pressure system stuck over the region has since dumped more rain in the northern parts of Kyushu.
The Japan Meteorological Agency early Monday issued the highest-level warning in Kumamoto. The Fire and Disaster Management Agency issued evacuation adviseries to tens of thousands of people in Kumamoto and six other prefectures in the region.
Rescue workers in the region were searching for several people.
In Kumamoto, they were looking for three people. A family of three was hit by a mudslide while driving to an evacuation center. Two were dug out alive but a third person was still missing. Two others were missing elsewhere in the prefecture.
Several other people were also reported missing after falling into swollen rivers in Kumamoto and nearby Fukuoka prefecture.
Television footage showed muddy water gushing down, carrying broken trees and branches, and residents wading through knee-deep floodwater.
Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba said his government was supporting search and rescue operations for the missing and helping others in affected areas. He urged residents “to use maximum caution,” encouraging them to “please prioritize actions to save your lives.”
Heavy rain also impacted people traveling during Japan’s Buddhist “bon” holiday week.
Bullet trains connecting Kagoshima and Hakata in northern Kyushu, as well as local train services, were suspended Monday morning. Services were partially resumed in areas where the rain subsided. About 6,000 households were out of power in Kumamoto, according to Kyushu Electric Power Co.