Now in exile in Boston and working for MIT, Andriy Tuz wonders if he will ever be able to go home again
When Russian troops last year launched the first-ever armed assault on a nuclear facility, Andriy Tuz became the voice to the West of what seemed a looming disaster.
As spokesman for Ukraine’s sprawling Zaporizhzhia complex, the 33-year-old appeared on local television, Western media and in solemn online updates to describe chaotic scenes of falling shells and gunfire that shocked nuclear-safety experts and governments worldwide.
“Shooting is being continued, from air and tank,” Tuz told CNN’s Anderson Cooper. “Any moment, it may result in nuclear accidents.”
In the months that followed, after Zaporizhzhia was taken, Tuz said he was tortured by the Russians and his mother’s life was threatened. And then to get out of prison, he agreed to make a video disavowing his previous statements that the facility wasn’t safe. He said he doesn’t believe that now, and he didn’t believe it then. He worries that the risk of nuclear terrorism remains high at Zaporizhzhia.
The logic is that, so far, nothing happened. That’s all I said. “So far he was wrong and the facility is safe.” The larger point is that this story his treatment and I drew a parallel to Ukraine’s treatment of a US journalist.
So I just want to hear you say it then:
“I believe that shelling near a nuclear reactor does not increase the risk of a nuclear disaster.”
Go ahead, if you really think he was wrong, then that’s the position you are committing to, so you should be able to simply say it.