Radiation in safe range where Chornobyl soil was dug up, IAEA says

FILE PHOTO: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Grossi speaks to the media as he visits the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Chornobyl, Ukraine April 26, 2022. REUTERS/Oleksandr Ratushniak/File Photo

VIENNA (Reuters) - Radiation levels in a part of Chornobyl's exclusion zone where Ukraine has said Russian troops dug trenches in the highly contaminated soil are elevated but still well within the safe range, the U.N. nuclear watchdog's chief said on Thursday.

International Atomic Energy Agency chief Rafael Grossi travelled to Chornobyl this week with IAEA staff to bring equipment and check radiation levels at the site which includes radioactive waste facilities near the now-defunct power plant that in 1986 suffered the world's worst nuclear disaster.