ENERHODAR, Ukraine — The mayor of Enerhodar, the site of Europe’s largest nuclear plant, says Ukrainian forces are battling Russian troops on the edges of the city.
Enerhodar is a major energy hub in southeast Ukraine that accounts for about one-quarter of the country’s power generation due to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant. The plant, located on the left bank of the Dnieper River and the Khakhovka Reservoir, is Europe’s largest.
The town is located in southeastern Ukraine, about 150 miles north of the Crimean peninsula — the region of the country that Russia annexed in 2014.
Dmytro Orlov, the mayor of Enerhodar, said Thursday that a large Russian convoy was approaching the city and urged residents not to leave homes.
Videos posted to Facebook earlier this week showed hundreds of Ukrainians blocking an access road that leads to the Zaporizhzhia plant. Many in the group were carrying Ukrainian flags, and others parked garbage trucks and other vehicles on the road to block the way.
“We conveyed the position of our city and its residents that the ZNPP is under reliable protection, that its workers and residents of Enerhodar are under Ukrainian flags,” Orlov said on his Facebook Wednesday. “All municipal services are working in emergency mode. Nobody is going to surrender the city. People are determined.”
