Russia accused Ukraine of striking the plant, controlled by Russian forces, three times on Sunday and demanded the West respond, though Kyiv said it had nothing to do with the attacks, the Reuters news agency reported.
It cited a Ukrainian intelligence official as saying that Kyiv had nothing to do with any strikes on the station and suggested they were the work of the Russians themselves.
"Russian strikes, including imitation ones, on the territory of the Ukrainian nuclear power plant ... have long been a well known criminal practice of the invaders," a spokesman for Ukraine's HUR Main Intelligence Directorate, Andriy Usov, said, as cited by Reuters.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which has experts at the site, said the attacks had endangered nuclear safety, according to Reuters.
'Attacking a nuclear power plant is an absolute no go': IAEA chief
"This is a major escalation of the nuclear safety and security dangers facing the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant," IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi said in a statement.
"Such reckless attacks significantly increase the risk of a major nuclear accident and must cease immediately," he added.
"Attacking a nuclear power plant is an absolute no go," Grossi also said. "I firmly appeal to military decision makers to abstain from any action violating the basic principles that protect nuclear facilities.”
Russian forces took control of the Zaporizhzhia plant, Europe's largest nuclear power station, shortly after their full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Since then Moscow and Kyiv have repeatedly traded blame for attacks around the site, according to reports.
Russia invaded Ukraine by land, air and sea on February 24, 2022, starting the largest armed conflict in Europe since World War II.
Monday is day 775 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.
The IAEA is an autonomous international organization within the United Nations system that aims to coordinate “all activities related to the peaceful uses of nuclear science and technology,” according to the Polish foreign ministry.
The organization was established in 1957, with Poland as one of its founding members.
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Source: Reuters, IAR, PAP, iaea.org