Establishing a protection zone around Europe’s largest nuclear power station in Ukraine is taking far more time than expected would, but “avoiding a nuclear accident is worth this time”, International Atomic Energy Agency director-general Rafael Grossi said on Wednesday (18 January).

Grossi told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour that the situation regarding the six-unit Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station in southeastern Ukraine is “challenging”.

“This is a war zone,” he said. Zaporizhzhia is in an active combat zone so establishing any form of exemption from military action is not something you agree to easily.

“There are certain parameters, territorial parameters, obligations, exceptions, exemptions that are being negotiated and all my effort is put into having a successful outcome, which I believe is possible.”

Grossi, who is making and sixth visit to Ukraine since the war started, was also scheduled to visit Russia, where negotiations on the Zaporizhzhia protection zone could continue. He refuted a suggestion by Amanpour that Russian officials had said the IAEA does not have “the statutory or technological capabilities to prevent a nuclear catastrophe”.