As fighting rages around the continent's largest nuclear power plant, fears are growing that Europe may be on the brink of a nuclear disaster.
A shell hit a building near the Zaporizhia power plant today as Ukrainian and Russian soldiers battled for control of a strategically important area.
Kyiv said the site was hit by explosives fired five times by invaders, including near a radioactive material storage unit.
The Russian Ministry of Defense claimed that the Ukrainian military was responsible for damaging the thermal power plant and part of the cooling system.
Kremlin soldiers have occupied the area since March, but Ukrainian engineers continue to operate the factory itself, effectively at gunpoint.
The United Nations urgently calls for a ceasefire zone around the base to prevent the risk of a nuclear disaster.
An emergency meeting of the Security Council was convened in New York to discuss today's deteriorating situation.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has accused Russia of using nuclear power plants to "threat the whole world."
UN Secretary-General António Guterres said:
"Instead, we need urgent agreement at the technical level on safe demilitarization boundaries to ensure regional security."
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) experts have sought an agreement between the two warring sides so that inspections can be carried out.
The monitoring agency has previously expressed concern that the station's security measures may have been compromised, stating that at some point all connections to radiation data were lost.
Russia's ambassador to the United Nations, Vasily Nebenzia, said the world was "on the brink of a nuclear disaster on a scale comparable to Chernobyl" and sought to shift the blame to Ukraine.
Ukraine has resisted her IAEA inspection. This is because it is used to justify Moscow's control of power plants that could be used to supply energy to the occupied territories.
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