Western Europe might be getting ready to a nuclear catastrophe in line with a number one chemical weapons skilled and former British Army colonel. He has claimed it's "quite likely" that Russian forces have planted "explosives" within the reactors on the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant with a view to blowing them up.

Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, who was commanding officer of the UK's Joint Chemical, Biological and Nuclear Regiment, informed Express.co.uk that below the present climate situations a catastrophe on the Zaporizhzhia plant would possible see radiation journey "westwards".

The former British Army officer warned: "Let's say they [Russia] do blow it up… if they've wired the reactors and blow them up, there will likely be an quantity of contamination created.

"The explosions would possible create a hearth then that might create the contamination. Now relying on the climate that is dependent upon the place the contamination is [headed].

'Putin won't have to push atomic button' 

He continued: "I feel with the climate how it's in the intervening time, it seems possible that many of the contamination would go westwards predominantly [towards] western Ukraine, western Zaporizhzhia, in all probability up into Poland and into Germany, and will transcend."

In a chilling nod to the 1986 Chernobyl catastrophe, the bio-security skilled famous that radioactive contamination reaching the UK just isn't out of the query: "You know, when Chernobyl blew up a lot of contamination actually landed in north Wales, so at this stage one can’t predict it."

Mr de Bretton-Gordon, who suggested the Government within the wake of the Salisbury Novichok poisoning, stated that though engineered explosions inside the reactors of the Zaporizhzhia facility wouldn't create the "mushroom cloud" of a nuclear bomb, he conceded it could enable Putin to carry a few nuclear assault on the West with out having to push the atomic button.

He stated grimly: "I describe it as an improvised nuclear weapon".

The veteran added that Ukrainian intelligence concerning the presence of explosives units inside the Zaporizhzhia plant might be right, because the spy service has confirmed itself dependable concerning earlier claims about Russian exercise. In explicit, he stated, Ukrainian intelligence surrounding the presence of Russian explosives across the Kakhovka Dam, which appeared to have been blown up on June 6, was accuarate.

He defined: "The data and intelligence popping out over the past 10 days to 2 weeks… one is from the Ukraine intelligence providers saying that the Russians have mined and put explosives within the reactors, and that declare has been fairly constant.

"When you have a look at the [Kakhovka] dam, Ukraine intelligence claimed the identical and so they have been completely proper. So, the Russians mined the dam and blew it up, creating an enormous eceologial catastrophe not dissimilar in scale to what occurred when Chernobyl blew up.

He continued: "So we then look at what is the likelihood that explosives are being placed within the reactors and within the [nuclear fuel] pools - to me it seems quite likely. It’s a very small step from blowing up a dam that has affected two or three million people, to blowing up a nuclear power station."

President Zelensky, in a joint press convention with visiting Spanish PM Pedro Sánchez, expressed his grave considerations that the Kremlin is plotting to assault the nuclear plant in a determined try to show the tide of the battle again in his favour.

He stated: "There is a serious threat because Russia is technically ready to provoke a local explosion at the station that could cause an emission of dangerous substances in the air.

"We are clearly speaking, we mentioned the necessity with our companions so everybody understands why Russia is doing this."