The Kremlin mentioned on Tuesday that no substantive progress had been made in the direction of making a safety zone round Zaporizhzhia nuclear energy plant in southern Ukraine, as soon as once more accusing Kyiv of shelling on the plant and risking a nuclear incident.

Ukraine denies these fees and has levelled the identical accusations at Russia.

“Talking concerning the safety zone, one ought to solely discuss those that are shelling this station. Who’s a risk? The risk is those that are bombarding it,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov mentioned.

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Zaporizhzhia nuclear energy plant, which Russia seized shortly after its Feb. 24 invasion, was once more rocked by shelling on the weekend, resulting in renewed calls from the Worldwide Atomic Power Company (IAEA) to create a safety zone round it to stop a nuclear catastrophe.

Peskov mentioned Russia would preserve speaking to the IAEA.

The plant supplied a couple of fifth of Ukraine’s electrical energy earlier than Russia’s invasion, and has been pressured to function on back-up mills plenty of instances.

Repeated shelling of the plant has raised concern concerning the potential for a grave accident simply 500 km (300 miles) from the location of the world’s worst nuclear accident, the 1986 Chornobyl catastrophe.