The UN demands Russia’s exit from Europe’s largest nuclear plant in Ukraine

The United Nations General Assembly on Thursday called on Russia to “urgently withdraw its military and other unauthorized personnel” from Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant and return it to the full control of Ukrainian authorities.

The 193-member General Assembly approved a resolution with 99 votes in favor, nine against and 60 abstentions.

The Zaporizhzhia plant, Europe’s largest, was seized by Russia shortly after it launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. It has been shut down but needs outside power to keep its nuclear material cool and prevent a meltdown.

Read: Russia says Ukraine hit nuclear plant, Kiev denies it was behind attack

Speaking before the vote, Ukraine’s UN ambassador Sergiy Kyslytsya urged countries to vote in favor of the resolution, saying: “We owe this to future generations. We must ensure that the horrors of nuclear disasters are not repeated.”

Throughout the war, Ukraine and Russia blamed each other for bombing the factory and taking down power lines. Ukraine has rejected the Russian accusations, saying it did not attack nuclear facilities.

The UN resolution “calls for an immediate end to the Russian Federation’s attacks against Ukraine’s vital energy infrastructure, which increase the risk of a nuclear accident or incident at all of Ukraine’s nuclear facilities.”

Deputy Russian UN Ambassador Dmitry Polyansky told the General Assembly before the vote that the aim of the resolution was “to try to promote the false Western narrative about the source of threats to nuclear facilities in Ukraine.”

At the General Assembly he held what he said was the debris of a Ukrainian drone that had been used to attack the Zaporizhzhia power plant on April 7. Ukraine has denied it was behind the drone attacks Polyanskiy cited.

Russia was diplomatically isolated several times during the first year of the war, when nearly three-quarters of the General Assembly voted repeatedly to denounce Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine and demand that it withdraw its troops.

The resolution passed on Thursday again demands that Russia “immediately cease its aggression against Ukraine and unconditionally withdraw all its military forces.”

The General Assembly has been the focus of UN action on Ukraine because the 15-member Security Council has been paralyzed by Russia, which has veto power along with the United States, China, France and Britain.

The Security Council has just held dozens of meetings on Ukraine.