Renewed Shelling Threatens Key Ukrainian Nuclear Plant

Local residents walk on a street in Stepnohirsk on the east bank of the Dnipro River, south of Zaporizhzhia, on November 9, 2022, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. (AFP)

Powerful explosions from shelling shook Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia region, the site of Europe's largest nuclear power plant, the global nuclear watchdog said Sunday, calling for "urgent measures to help prevent a nuclear accident" in the Russian-occupied facility. 

Rafael Mariano Grossi, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, said multiple explosions near the plant — on Saturday evening and again on Sunday morning — abruptly ended a period of relative calm around the nuclear facility that has been the site of fighting between Russian and Ukrainian forces since Russia invaded on Feb. 24.