Iran is warning of possible radiation exposure after a strike near its Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant on Saturday.
Iranian media reported that a projectile from a U.S.-Israeli strike hit near the Bushehr plant, located along the Persian Gulf. Iran said one worker was killed by projectile fragments and a nearby building “was affected by shockwaves and fragments,” according to the International Atomic Energy Agency, which received news of the attack from Tehran.
In a letter to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres hours after, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi sounded the alarm about strikes on the Bushehr plant, saying they “expose the entire region to a serious risk of radioactive contamination with serious human and environmental consequences.”
“The repeated attacks by the aggressors in the vicinity of the active Bushehr nuclear power plant are of great concern,” he wrote. “The proximity of these attacks to an active nuclear facility creates an intolerable situation that poses a serious risk of radiological release.”
Araghchi claimed this was the fourth time the Bushehr facility has been targeted since the start of the war in late February. He said any possible release of radioactive material poses a greater risk to the Gulf countries, given Bushehr’s proximity to the Persian Gulf.
The IAEA also said Director-General Rafael Grossi expressed “deep concern about the reported incident and says NPP sites or nearby areas must never be attacked.”
However, the IAEA determined there was “no increase in radiation levels” after the reported strike.
Grossi has previously singled out Bushehr as the one Iranian nuclear site “where the consequences of an attack could be most serious.”
“It is an operating nuclear power plant and as such it hosts thousands of kilograms of nuclear material,” Grossi said last summer. “In case of an attack on the Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant a direct hit could result in a very high release of radioactivity to the environment.”
The facility, which hosts one nuclear reactor, was spared in the U.S. military operation last June that targeted three Iranian nuclear facilities.
But that has not been the case since the start of the U.S.-Israeli war in Iran. Iran has reported multiple strikes near the facility, while at least one in March hit inside the premises.
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The attacks have irked Russia as well, due to its presence at the plant through its energy agency, Rosatom. Russia has already evacuated hundreds of its staff members from Bushehr.
According to the Associated Press, Iran had been trying to dramatically expand the Bushehr plant in recent years, planning to add two more nuclear reactors.
