Ukraine: World Close to Nuclear Disaster, U.S. OKs Attacks on Crimea

With each day that passes, the closer the world gets to a major calamity

A senior Biden administration official said the U.S. supports strikes on Crimea, which was annexed by Russia in 2014, if Kyiv sees it as needed in its fight against Russia, according to a report.

Politico reported that the official said the U.S. does not help select targets and “everything we’ve provided is for self-defense purposes.”

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But he concluded, “Crimea is Ukraine.”

This week’s Trends Journal covered the fighting in Ukraine extensively and noted that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said last week that the conflict with Russia will only end after Kyiv liberates Crimea, which was annexed by Moscow in 2014.

“Crimea is Ukrainian, and we'll never give up on it,” Zelensky said, adding that Kyiv is “constantly adding new components to the formula of liberating” the area.

ZAPORIZHZHIA

Fighting around Europe’s largest nuclear plant continues to be a growing concern.

NBC News reported that Russia has told workers at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant not to show up to work on Friday due to concerns that Ukraine could be planning an attack there.

Ukrainian officials leveled the same allegations against Russia.

Vassily Nebenzia, Russia's ambassador to the UN, said last week that Kiev’s actions near the Zaporozhye nuclear plant could lead to a catastrophe on the same level as the Chernobyl blast in 1986.

“Obviously, this contradicts the facts that we have repeatedly cited, including within the walls of the Security Council,” the statement read. “It is undeniable that the attacks on the station and Energodar are carried out by Ukrainian armed groups acting on orders from Kiev.”

Ukraine’s military confirmed that it used a kamikaze drone to kill Russian soldiers who were inside a tent about 150 yards from a reactor, The New York Times reported.

Both sides have assigned blame to the other for targeting Europe’s largest nuclear facility in the city on the Dnieper River in southeastern Ukraine.

The facility has been controlled by the Russians since the early days of the war, but it is being operated by Ukrainian staff. The site has been targeted in attacks over the past few weeks that are becoming more dangerous by the day, according to Nebenzia.

“We’ve repeatedly warned our western colleagues that, should they fail to talk sense into the Kyiv regime, it would take the most heinous and reckless steps, which would have consequences far beyond Ukraine,” she told the UN Security Council last week, according to RT. “That is exactly what is happening.”

TRENDPOST:  The  Trends Journal  has been against Russian President Vladimir Putin's decision to invade Ukraine since the beginning of the conflict, but we have consistently pointed out that the invasion was not unprovoked. We have also been reporting that the western media has only been reporting on one side of the story: the Ukrainian side. 

In fact, after the Russian invasion, Pope Francis agreed, saying, “NATO barking at Russia’s gate may have compelled [Russian President Vladimir] Putin to unleash the invasion of Ukraine. I have no way of telling whether his rage has been provoked, but I suspect it was, maybe, facilitated by the West’s attitude.”

Both Ukraine and Russia have been blaming each other for attacking the nuclear facility but one has to wonder why Russia, which is trying to connect the facility to the Crimean electricity grid, would purposely attack the power plant. 

“It’s encouraging to see that the Russians want to use the electricity; that does imply that they don’t want to damage [the power plant],” Michael Black, the director of the Centre of Nuclear Engineering at Imperial College London, told Al Jazeera.

Nuclear reactors need to be cooled by a steady flow of water and there is concern that the facility is not getting the proper equipment and supplies to safely operate.