RUSSIAN forces have fired rockets at a nuclear research facility in the besieged city of Kharkiv, Ukrainian officials have claimed.
A Ukrainian minister warned the shelling of Kharkiv's Institute of Physics and Technology could lead to a "major environmental disaster".
The institute is home to a facility called Neutron Source which contains a nuclear reactor used for research.
The same site was attacked by Russian troops earlier this month.
On Saturday, the Ukrainian parliament said it wasn't possible to assess the extent of the damage from the latest attack due to fierce fighting in the area.
The State Nuclear Regulatory Inspectorate of Ukraine reportedly said: "The continuation of its bombardment can lead to severe radiation consequences with contamination of nearby territories."
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The agency previously accused Russia of committing an "act of nuclear terrorism" by bombing the research facility.
Emine Dzheppar, Ukraine's deputy minister of foreign affairs, said: "The Russian aggressor fired rocket 'Grad' systems on the territory of the Kharkiv Institute, where the nuclear installation 'Source of Neutrons' is located, in the active zone of which 37 fuel nuclear cells were loaded.
"The destruction of a nuclear facility and nuclear material storage facilities could lead to a major environmental disaster.
"Ukraine continues to gather evidence of (Russian) war crimes to The Hague."
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Kharkiv – Ukraine's second largest city – has seen some of the worst bombing since the war began on February 24.
It comes after Russian forces took control of an area near the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, Interfax Ukraine news agency quoted the local mayor as saying.
The governor of Kyiv region, Oleksandr Pavlyuk, had earlier announced the capture of Slavutych in an online post.
The town sits just outside a safety exclusion zone around Chernobyl – the site of the world's worst nuclear disaster in 1986 – where Ukrainian staff have continued to manage the site even after it was occupied by Russian forces.
The Russian military seized the decommissioned Chernobyl plant in the first week of the invasion as one of their first objectives.
"Slavutych has been under occupation since today. We steadfastly defended our city… three deaths have been confirmed so far," mayor Yuri Fomichev said.
While Russia's war in Ukraine is unlikely to see the use of nuclear weapons, it is feared reckless behaviour by the Russians could trigger a new catastrophe.
The International Atomic Energy Agency said it was closely monitoring the situation and raised concerns about the ability of staff to rotate in and out of the atomic power station.
WAR HOTSPOT
Pavlyuk said the Russians fired into the air to disperse a protest in the centre of the town and threw stun grenades into the crowd.
Ukrainian presidential adviser Oleksiy Arestovych said the town had become a new hotspot of the war.
Russian troops have already stolen "unstable" nuclear samples after ransacking a lab at the Chernobyl power plant.
Putin's men are believed to have then destroyed the £5million lab which was full of nuclear waste and located in the radioactive exclusion zone, according to The State Agency of Ukraine.
The agency said the stolen radionuclides are “highly active".
Radionuclides are unstable atoms of chemical elements that release radiation – the fact these are now in the hands of the Russians is a major concern.
It said it hoped Russian troops “will harm themselves and not the civilized world” with their lethal loot from the November Central Analytical Laboratory.
In a statement, the agency said: "The laboratory contained highly active samples and samples of radionuclides that are now in the hands of the enemy."
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Worryingly, radiation levels let off from the destruction of the lab cannot be measured as the Russians destroyed the monitoring system, according to state nuclear company Energoatom.
Communications with the site have been intermittent since the invasion.
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