Ukrainian soldiers walk past buildings in the city of Druzhkivka that Ukrainian sources say were damaged by Russian shelling Photo: picture alliance/dpa/AP
From BZ/dpa
With apparently false photos, the Russian Foreign Ministry has tried to give the impression that it has evidence that a “dirty” – i.e. nuclear-contaminated – bomb was being built in Ukraine.
One of the pictures, which appeared on the ministry’s English-language Twitter account, belongs to the Slovenian Agency for Radioactive Waste and dates from 2010, the online newspaper Ukrajinska Pravda reported on Wednesday.
The photo is captioned “Development of the “dirty bomb””. It features items in plastic bags marked with the radioactivity warning symbol.
Nuclear experts from the Slovenian government were the first to recognize the picture: smoke detectors can be seen in the photo, it said. The Slovenian government announced on Twitter that it had been used for presentations.
“Radioactive waste in Slovenia is kept safe and under surveillance. It will not be used to build “dirty bombs,” the government quoted the radioactive waste management agency chief as saying.
The Russian government has been warning of an alleged radioactive bomb in Kiev’s hands since the beginning of the week. Their use on Ukrainian territory should therefore be intended to discredit Moscow. Western governments have dismissed the allegations as implausible.
The Russian accusation that Kyiv is planning to use a radioactive bomb is interpreted in the West as a possible pretext for a further escalation of the war. Kyiv rejects the allegations.