Russian troops handed control of Chernobyl nuclear power plant back to the Ukrainians and began leaving the radiated site more than a month after taking it over, authorities said on Thursday.
Ukraine’s state power company, Energoatom, claimed Russian soldiers were leaving after they received “significant doses” of radiation from digging trenches in the forest in the exclusion zone around the closed plant.
The withdrawal took place as Nato’s secretary general warned the Kremlin was using talk of de-escalation as cover to regroup its forces and redeploy them for a stepped-up offensive in the eastern part of the country.
Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukrainian forces had pushed back the Russians from Kyiv and Chernihiv – two cities Moscow had announced would no longer be the focus of attacks as they seek to secure the separatist Donbas and Luhansk regions in the southeast.
“There will be battles ahead. We still need to go down a very difficult path to get everything we want,” he said.
“The situation in the south and in the Donbas remains extremely difficult.”
