This morning, an urgent warning from Ukrainian President Zelensky, who says objects that look like explosives have been found on two nuclear reactors, ends up Burisma And he says Russia put them there. This Operation Power Plant is Europe's largest nuclear plant. Russia has occupied the plant since the beginning of its war in Ukraine. Ever since, there has been a grave global concern that Russian forces could carry out a catastrophic nuclear attack. Zelensky's. Direct message to Moscow right now the world sees and the world is ready to respond. CNN Scott McLean is in London for us tracking this threat. Scott, we've heard from Zelensky on this, but Russia also has its own version of events. What are you hearing? Yeah, so look, Zelensky says that the only threat to the planet right now is from Russia. The Russians say that they are no threat at all. In fact, they've previously said that the International Atomic Energy Agency, they have inspectors, they have employees who are working at the site right now. And it was last week, actually, that the IAEA put out a statement saying that they have seen no evidence of any bombs or any mines located on that site. Though the caveat is they say that they still would need more fuller access to the site itself in order to say that with 100% certainty. The Russians say that, look, the threat here is from Ukraine. Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin spokesperson, said this and I quote earlier today, There is a great threat of sabotage by Kiev, which can have catastrophic consequences. For the record, Sara, President Zelensky isn't putting out any specific evidence of his allegations here of these explosives on site, but he is saying that this would essentially be a false flag operation, echoing what the Ukrainian military has said before and that any explosion would make it look like this was the result of Ukrainian shelling, but wouldn't be powerful enough to actually damage the reactors themselves. Still, the Ukrainians say that their emergency services have been preparing for this kind of possibility. Special Forces from Ukraine are on alert as well. And the Russians say that they are also prepared for this. So everyone here is on high alert. I just want to show you a satellite image as well, just to kind of better illustrate this area. So the reactors themselves, which you should be able to see on the top of this image, of this image, those red circles there. They're housed in these containment buildings which are designed to be able to withstand the force of an accidental plane crash, how they would hold up against the weapons of war. We don't have a good answer to that. But also keep in mind that at the bottom of your screen there you see those rectangles. They're those dark rectangles. Those are cooling ponds which store the spent nuclear fuel rods. And they are right out there in the open. They have no protection at all. So there's not a whole lot of margin for error that we're talking about here. The good news is that we are getting some reassuring signs from nuclear officials on both sides of the front line. And the Ukrainians say that the situation is stable. The Russian backed officials and the occupied parts of Ukraine where this plant is located they say that the background radiation levels are normal. They also call, Zelensky's claims, garbage. One other thing to quickly mention, Sarah, and that is that the Kremlin today is denying a report in the Financial Times that Chinese President Xi Jinping had warned Russian President Vladimir Putin against using nuclear weapons in Ukraine. The Kremlin calling that report, quote, fiction. Sara, I think that's what you're hearing Phil Linsky say the world is watching. Thank you so much for all of that, Scott. John All right. Let me give you a sense of where all this is taking place. If you can see the map right here. The separation nuclear power plant is right here that has been in Russian hands since the beginning. Of the invasion. Zap reach of the city is still in Ukrainian hands and has been since the very beginning and a great deal of the fighting in the counteroffensive has been happening along the salient right here. You can see I think you can see more. You can't from where you are in yellow. These are some of the towns and cities that Ukraine has taken back in the counteroffensive. That is where they have made some progress. Let's bring in retired U.S. Army Brigadier General Steve Anderson. General, great to see you. I want to put up pictures again of this at four U.S. nuclear power plant. How much of a disaster would it be from a strategic standpoint if Russia did sabotage this plant? Well, thank you, John. Well, this would be a huge disaster. Operationally and strategically, I mean, it's in some of the richest farmland in the world is within 50 to 100 miles of this facility, the largest nuclear power plant in Europe. And that is incredibly impactful on the world food supply, potentially, not to mention, of course, the threat, the loss of life and whatnot. So this is why the International Atomic Energy Commission has got to actually step up, get inspectors on there and confirm or deny the state of the situation there. The other thing I think that's being pointed out by Japan's operations on the ground is that retaking Zapier Asia is a high priority for this Ukrainian counter-offensive. So they, too, need to step it up. Vladimir Putin is desperate. We saw what he did. His reaction to the recent Wagner group defection He's becoming increasingly vulnerable internally. And so there's no limit to what this desperate man might very well do. He's already taken out the dam that has the potential to impact some of those six reservoirs that Scott just pointed out and the facility, because this is Zamperini is a pressurized water reactor. Chernobyl was a graphite moderated reactor. What that means is they need water. They need water and cooling towers and containment facilities and all those things are made out of concrete. And, you know, and weapons of war can take down those those concrete structures. So this is a grave threat. And we need to step it up with the International Atomic Energy Commission and operationally on the ground.
