Ukraine's Zaporizhzhya nuclear plant cut off from power

Power to the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant in south-eastern Ukraine has been cut again as the wider area has been suffering from an outage, the plant's management said on Thursday.

The high-voltage power line leading to the plant had been automatically shut down on Wednesday evening, management said, adding that the site's standby diesel generators had taken over the power supply. No increased levels of radioactivity were detected.

"The night passed relatively calmly in Enerhodar and the area surrounding the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant," Yevgeniya Yashina, the plant's communications director appointed by Moscow, told Russian state news agency TASS.

She reported some isolated drone attacks, but said the entire city was without power.

Russia occupied the Zaporizhzhya plant in the city of Enerhodar, which is Europe's largest nuclear power plant, in the early days of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine launched in February 2022.

All six reactors have since been shut down for safety reasons, but a reliable supply of electricity is needed to keep them cool.

Kiev and Moscow have repeatedly accused each other of shelling the plant.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has stationed observers at the site and asked the warring parties to exercise restraint to prevent a nuclear accident.