The Times - UK (2022-03-18)

6 Friday March 18 2022 | the times

News

A hundred exhausted technicians are
working in abysmal conditions under
armed guard to maintain the Cherno-
byl nuclear plant in northern Ukraine,
raising safety fears at the defunct
reactor.
They have been held hostage for
three weeks by Russian forces that
seized the compound in the first hours
of the invasion.
The technicians, who were working
the night shift when Russia captured
the site, are tired and poorly fed,
according to the AFP news agency.
Their relatives and colleagues said the
workers had been prevented from re-
turning to their homes in Slavutych, the
city built to house Chernobyl workers
after the 1986 core meltdown, the worst
nuclear reactor catastrophe in history.
“Physically and morally, they are
exhausted,” the wife of one technician
said. “They think that no one cares
about them, neither the Russian gov-
ernment nor the Ukrainian govern-
ment.” She added that they were receiv-
ing only two small meals a day.
“They can take a shower but with no
soap, no shampoo. They can’t brush
their teeth. They can’t change their
clothes or wash them. There is no sup-
ply of medicines. They are sleeping on
the floor, on desks or on chairs.”
About 100 other people, including

A

cookbook

author

described

as “Russia’s

Nigella

Lawson” is one of the

first people to face a

criminal investigation

under President

Putin’s censorship

laws (Tom Ball and

Adam Sage write).

Veronika

Belotserkovskaya, 51,

who is believed to be

at her home on the

French Riviera, is

accused of spreading

“false information”

about what the

Kremlin calls its

“special military

operation” by the

Investigative

Committee of Russia,

the country’s

prosecution office.

Under laws designed

to curtail freedom

of speech and

independent reporting

on the war, the author,

who is known as

Belonika or Nika,

could face up to 15

years in jail if she

returns to Russia.

Writing to her

more than 900,

followers on

Instagram, she said

that she would “most

likely never be able

to go home again”.

Belotserkovskaya,

who was born in the

Ukrainian port city

Odesa, when it was

in the Soviet Union,

has written several

successful cookbooks

and owns a publishing

house. She also

arranges gastronomic

tours of Europe.

She is alleged to

have posted

“deliberately false

information about the

use of the Russian

armed forces to

destroy cities and the

civilian population of

Ukraine, including

children”.

Russian media

outlets said that

Moscow was likely

to seek an arrest

warrant for her.

The government has

consistently denied

claims by Ukraine and

the West that it has

been targeting

civilians. In posts

about the invasion,

Belotserkovskaya

denounced the

operation as “an

aggressive war against

a sovereign state”.

She insisted that she

was a proud Russian

but added that she was

“absolutely horrified

by how many mothers

Russian Nigella Lawson

faces jail under Putin’s law

News War in Ukraine

A senior Russian security service offi-
cial is believed to have been detained
for allegedly leaking information about
the Kremlin’s military operation in
Ukraine, a sign that President Putin
may be seeking scapegoats for his ar-
my’s failure to achieve a rapid victory.
General Roman Gavrilov, the deputy
head of the national guard, often called
Putin’s private army, was taken into cus-
tody yesterday by the FSB state security
service, according to sources cited by
Bellingcat, the investigative journalism
website.
His detention was also reported by
Vladimir Osechkin, an exiled Russian
dissident who cited a source as saying
that Gavrilov, 46, was being questioned
in Moscow on espionage charges
related to the movement of Russian
troops that led to the death of more
than 100 servicemen. “The configura-
tion of the state security structure in
Moscow is changing dramatically,”
Osechkin wrote on social media.
Other sources told Bellingcat that
Gavrilov was suspected of the “wasteful
squandering of fuel”. Osechkin wrote
later that it was possible that Gavrilov
would be dismissed from his post and
released without preliminary charges.
Osechkin, who published video evi-
dence last year of torture in Russia’s
prisons, also recently cited another
anonymous security source who said
he feared that Putin and his allies would
unleash a wave of political terror. “For

Chernobyl safety fears as hungry,

exhausted workers held captive

James Callery security personnel, are also being de-
tained at the site.
It is unclear why Russian soldiers
seized Chernobyl, where the destroyed
reactor is monitored closely under its
concrete and lead sarcophagus. Three
other reactors at the site are in the pro-
cess of being decommissioned.
In 2017 Chernobyl was one of several
Ukrainian targets hit by a cyberattack
thought to have originated in Russia,
which briefly took radiation monitor-
ing systems offline.
On Sunday several dozen people, in-
cluding women and children, held a
protest in Slavutych over the treatment
of workers at the plant, as well as the
safety risks. “Our boys are not just hos-
tages but prisoners in a Russian con-
centration camp,” one protester told
local television.
The electricity supply to Chernobyl
has been cut on several occasions since
the Russian takeover.
Rafael Grossi, the head of the Inter-
national Atomic Energy Agency, said
on Tuesday that to ensure against
radioactivity risks, “operating staff
must be able to fulfil their safety and
security duties and have the capacity to
make decisions free of undue pressure”.
A Chernobyl engineer told AFP that
the employees were “deeply worried
they will be on the front line if an acci-
dent happens”. A pool where spent fuel
is stocked is “overpacked by 40 per

cent”, she added. “Back-up pools should

be empty but they too are filled with

spent fuel. This situation is against

international nuclear safety regula-

tions.”

Russian forces also shelled and cap-

tured the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power

plant, Europe’s largest, on March 4,

causing a fire that raised alarm in

Europe over a possibly catastrophic re-

lease of radiation.

Karine Herviou, deputy director

general of France’s IRSN nuclear safety

watchdog, said there was “no risk of an

explosion at Chernobyl... a sustained

loss of electricity supply to the site will

not cause an accident”.

But the risks of war remain, with the

relative of one technician saying that

Russia had built “a military base” at

Chernobyl, with missile batteries.

“The strategy is brilliant on the war

side but for humanity it is insane — no

one will fire a missile on Chernobyl,”

said one relative of a technician, himself

a former employee at the site.

He added that the chances of a disas-

ter were high, not least because of

alleged safety breaches by Ukrainian

officials — which he claimed to have

seen — but also because the Russian

guards “don’t know what’s going on”.

He said: “In nuclear safety, you always

try to forecast the worst scenario and

avoid it. Right now they are trying to

hide it, like the USSR did in 1986.”.

Kremlin ‘arrests top

general’ in hunt for

invasion scapegoats

the past 20 years they have lived in ab-

solute power, surrounded by opportun-

ists. They consider themselves gods.

And they don’t see reality. But deep

down they are terribly afraid,” he said.

Alexander Khinshtein, an MP with

Putin’s United Russia party, told state

television that the report was an “abso-

lute fake” and that he had spoken to Ga-

vrilov. There has been no other official

comment.

The Russian national guard, which

was formed in 2016, is a 400,000-strong

force that incorporates interior minis-

try troops, the elite Omon riot squad

and the Sobr rapid-reaction unit. It is

said to have suffered heavy losses since

the start of the war. It is led by Viktor

Zolotov, a hardliner who was once

Putin’s judo sparring partner.

Zolotov and Gavrilov have previous-

ly provided personal security details for

Putin. Zolotov, who is also a member of

Russia’s national security council,

admitted this week that the invasion of

Ukraine was going more slowly than

expected.

A spy chief and his deputy were said

to have been placed under house arrest

last week after giving the Kremlin unre-

liable intelligence before the invasion of

Ukraine. Sergey Beseda, head of the

FSB’s foreign intelligence branch, was

arrested along with Anatoly Bolyukh,

his deputy, according to a leading ex-

pert on the Russian security services.

Andrei Soldatov, co-founder and edi-

tor of Agentura, an investigative web-

site that monitors the FSB, said last

week that Beseda’s arrest pointed to

Putin’s growing anger towards the

security services. “Putin has finally un-

derstood that he was misled,” Soldatov

said.

Beseda, 68, heads the FSB’s Fifth Ser-

vice, which is responsible for intelli-

gence-gathering in Ukraine. Bolyukh,

66, is head of the Department of Oper-

ative Information, which is a part of the

Fifth Service.

Some prominent Russian analysts

have said their opinions were ignored

by Moscow. Andrey Kortunov, head of

the Russian International Affairs

Council, which is close to the foreign

ministry, said recently that he had ad-

vised Moscow against an invasion to

force Nato to retreat from Russia’s bor-

ders. “I didn’t believe this war was poss-

ible,” he said.

Christo Grozev, a Bellingcat investi-

gator, wrote on Twitter: “While it’s hard

to guess what exactly the purge/reshuf-

fling at the top of the [security struc-

ture] will result in, one thing is clear: it’s

doubtless that Putin recognises the

deep shit this operation is in, ie it’s so

bad that he changes horses in mid-

stream — a big no-no during war.”

Tom Ball

Roman Gavrilov is

being questioned

on spying charges