Zelensky accuses Russia of detonating an “environmental bomb of mass destruction”

The Ukrainian President, Volodimir Zelensky, has described the destruction of a large dam on the Dniepe riverDuring his passage through the province of Khersonin southern Ukraine, of “massive environmental destruction bomb”, and has confirmed that Kyiv has already denounced Russia for it before international justice.

“The deliberate destruction of the dam and other infrastructure of the Nova Kakhovka hydroelectric power station by the Russian occupiers is an environmental bomb of mass destruction,” Zelensky said. in his address to the nation.

In his daily address to his citizens, the Ukrainian head of state has also reported that “the (Ukrainian) attorney general has already asked the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court to implicate international justice on investigation of the explosion at the dam“.

On the consequences of the disaster, which has caused the flooding of dozens of villages and is forcing the evacuation of thousands of people from the area, Zelenski has highlighted the drinking water supply problems that the overflow could mean for several regions of the south and south-east of Ukraine.

The Ukrainian president has assured that the authorities are “doing everything possible” to supply drinking water to provinces such as Krivói Rog, Dnipropetrovsk, Kherson, Mykolaiv and Zaporizhia.

Moscow and Kyiv blame each other for the destruction of the dam

While Zelensky has assured that Russia has deliberately prepared this attack on the dam, from Moscow they have indicated that Ukrainehe had been preparing the ground for months for its destruction. “Seek now to blame the victim for his own crimes. “This is a terrorist act against a critical Ukrainian infrastructure that seeks to cause the greatest number of civilian casualties and the greatest possible destruction,” stressed the Ukrainian ambassador to the UN, Sergiy Kyslytsya.

For their part, both the European Union as NATO consider that Russia has led its aggression against Ukraine to a new level with the destruction of said dam. “The European Union condemns this attack in the strongest possible terms. It represents a new dimension of Russian atrocities and could constitute a violation of international law, in particular international humanitarian law,” Borrell explained.

Zelenski indicates that 80 locations are “under water”

The dam, 30 meters (yards) high and 3.2 km (2 miles) long, holds water equivalent to that of the Great Salt Lake in the US state of Utah. It is in charge of supplying water to the Crimean peninsula, annexed by Russia in 2014, and to the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, Also under Russian control.

In just hours it could flood at least 80 settlements located on the banks of the Dnipro river. As early as October 2022, the pro-Russian authorities in the Kherson region of Ukraine began to release water from the dam of Nova Kajovka to reduce the water level and minimize a possible disaster if the prey was the target of attack.

The Ukrainian authorities estimate that about 40,000 people they have to evacuate areas that may be flooded by the destruction of the dam.