IAEA says Ukraine carried out first staff rotations at Chornobyl

FILE PHOTO: A general view shows the New Safe Confinement (NSC) structure over the old sarcophagus covering the damaged fourth reactor at the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Chornobyl, Ukraine November 22, 2018. REUTERS/Gleb Garanich/File Photo

ZURICH (Reuters) - Ukraine informed the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on Sunday that it had carried out the first staff rotation at the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant in three weeks, IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said, adding the agency would send a mission there soon to assist in returning in to normality.

Russian forces occupied the defunct power station north of Kyiv soon after invading Ukraine on Feb. 24 but Ukraine's state nuclear energy company, Energoatom, said in early April they had left the plant and were heading towards the border with Belarus.