Wildfire breaks out at Chernobyl but no radiation increase seen:
By RFE/RL
Ukrainian authorities say a wildfire has broken out in the exclusion zone around Chernobyl, where the world's worst nuclear accident occurred in 1986, but radiation levels remained within safe limits.
"Radiation levels have not risen either inside the exclusion zone or in adjoining areas," the zone's administration said in a statement on June 5.
Prime Minister Volodymyr Hroysman wrote on Facebook that "radiation levels are safe. In Kyiv and in Chernobyl itself, including at the Chernobyl power station site, they are significantly below the acceptable limits. So there's no need to worry."
"I stress once more: the situation is fully under control," he added.
The fire broke out in dry grass on the morning of June 5 in the area of high radiation less than 10 kilometers from the power station, and later spread over some 10 hectares of woodland, the state emergency service said in statements.
It published photographs of smoke billowing from woodland and flames spreading along the ground.
The state nuclear-industry regulator said the former nuclear power station was not at risk from the flames.
More than 130 firefighters were battling the fire as well as two planes and a helicopter that dumped water on the fire, the state emergency service said, adding that the wind was not blowing toward the capital, Kyiv.
Wildfires occur regularly in the woods and grassland around the power station. In 2015, a forest fire burned for four days.
Chernobyl's No. 4 reactor, which is about 100 kilometers north of Kyiv, exploded in 1986 during testing in the worst such accident ever.
Radioactive fallout from the power station contaminated up to three-quarters of Europe, according to some estimates, with Ukraine, Russia and Belarus, all then part of the U.S.S.R., the worst affected.
A 30 kilometers radius around the power station is still an exclusion zone where people are not allowed to live.
The three other reactors at Chernobyl continued to generate electricity until the power station finally closed in 2000. A giant protective dome was put in place over the fourth reactor in 2016. (w/AFP and TASS)
That concludes our live-blogging of the Ukraine crisis for Tuesday, June 5, 2018. Check back here tomorrow for more of our continuing coverage. Thanks for reading and take care.
Washington Highlights Importance Of Ukraine Anticorruption Court
By RFE/RL
The United States has highlighted the importance of establishing an independent anticorruption court in Ukraine as it called on Kyiv to implement comprehensive reforms and put an end to systematic corruption in the country.
In a statement issued on June 5, the U.S. State Department said, “The establishment of a genuinely independent anticorruption court is the most important, immediate step the government can take to meet those demands and roll back corruption that continues to threaten Ukraine’s national security, prosperity, and democratic development.”
The statement points out that the United States fully supports the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which will determine whether a new law establishing the court is consistent with Ukraine’s commitments under its IMF program.
“We agree with the IMF that any legislation establishing an anticorruption court must include a central role for a council of international experts to ensure the selection of qualified judges,” the statement says.
The bill to create an anticorruption court was approved by Ukraine’s parliament in its first reading on March 1, and President Petro Poroshenko said it should win final approval before spring ends.
The legislation has been demanded by protest groups and international institutions that provide Ukraine with financial support.
In March, European Union foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini told Poroshenko in Kyiv that establishing an independent anticorruption court would "help the business environment and the investment climate.”
However, some reformists in Ukraine and backers in Europe have said the bill in its current form does not meet standards set by the Council of Europe’s Venice Commission, a group of independent experts in constitutional law, and the requirements of the IMF.
The IMF has called the establishment of an anticorruption court a "benchmark" of Ukraine's progress toward Western legal standards and has said it would help ease the release of its loans in the future.