Nuclear facility in Kharkiv damaged by Russian shelling, Ukraine says

Russian forces shelled a nuclear research institute in Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city on Thursday, setting buildings on fire, says Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to Ukraine’s Interior Ministry.

The facility is part of the Kharkiv Institute of Physics and Technology, a research institute that produces radioactive material for medical and industrial applications.

A shell hit a building where there is equipment that could release radiation if it were damaged, Gerashchenko says. According to the president’s office, there has been no change in the background radiation.

The shelling caused a fire, but firefighters were able to put it out.

The same institute in Kharkiv was hit on Sunday, the IAEA reported earlier this week. At the time, the agency said that because the site’s “inventory of radioactive material is very low” and kept at a “subcritical” state, “the damage reported to it would not have had any radiological consequence.”

Russian forces have already taken over two nuclear power plants in Ukraine, raising concerns about the security of the nuclear facilities.