Ukraine: Russian troops exposed to nuclear radiation in danger of sickness

The head of Ukraine’s state nuclear power operator Energoatom, visited one of the sections of the so-called Red Forest in Chernobyl’s exclusion zone along with specialists and observed “abnormally high” radiation in areas where the Russian troops dug trenches and tried to build fortifications.

In a statement on Telegram, Petro Ketin said, “abnormally high rates of radiation were recorded” in the area.

Indications of external irradiation were 10-15 times higher than normal, and that possible internal radiation received from contact with the soil surface could be 160 times more than the norm, he added.

“Another factor of internal irradiation is Alpha pollution formed as a result of fragments of irradiated nuclear fuel, graphite masonry scattered on this section of the Red Forest” after the 1986 Chernobyl disaster,” the statement read.

“These fragments are now located at a depth of 40-80 centimeters, while the occupiers dug deeper. When inside the human body, this type of radiation has an effect tens and hundreds of times more powerful than that from gamma and beta radiation.”

“So all the occupiers who were based in and entrenched in the Red Forest, in almost 30 days, should expect radiation sickness of varying degrees of severity,” it added.

In a separate statement, Energoatom said Russian troops who occupied the territory of the Chernobyl plant “also looted and destroyed the offices and laboratory of the Institute for Nuclear Safety. They took away computers, office equipment, smashed or destroyed laboratory equipment and measuring devices, and looted garages with vehicles used to deliver scientists to research sites.”