The Institute for Safety Problems of Nuclear Power Plants (ISPNPP) told news outlets that a radiation monitoring lab near the Chernobyl nuclear site was looted during the Russian invasion.
The consequences of the Russian invasion of the exclusion zone around the nuclear power plant are still emerging.
Chernobyl was the site of the worst nuclear disaster in history. It was an early target in the Russian invasion of the Ukrainian capital.
The director of the ISPNPP said that looters took off with radioactive isotopes used to calibrate instruments, as well as nuclear waste left over from the 1986 nuclear accident.
He didn't say who took it.
The scientists were pushed out of the labs in the town of Chernobyl when the Russian troops took control of the area.
The material could be used to make a dirty bomb, a weapon that combines radioactive material with an explosives device to scatter contamination over a large area.
The dirty bomb does not cause a nuclear explosion. They are not thought to pose an immediate threat to health, but could be used by terrorist groups to cause panic.
Russia accused Ukraine of wanting to make a dirty bomb. Part of Russia's justification for invading was allegations that Ukraine was trying to develop nuclear weapons.
The materials could not be used to make a nuclear weapon, according to a nuclear expert. That would require plutonium or uranium, neither of which is likely to be in that kind of lab.
Russian soldiers left the exclusion zone 36 days after they arrived.
The Chernobyl nuclear power plant waslooted by the troops before they left, according to the Defense of Ukraine. They took lab equipment and radiation.
The power plant has been inactive for a long time but is still being worked on.
Russian troops occupied the site of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant and forced some Ukrainian staff to stay on-site for almost a month before they were allowed to leave.
The level of radiation around the site was raised by the invasion.
The Red Forest is the most contaminated area around the site of the nuclear accident, and Russian troops drove armored vehicles through it. The Russian troops were protected by the workers.
The reports were not independently verified.
The International Atomic Energy Agency launched an investigation into claims that troops were exposed to high levels ofContamination after digging trenches around Chernobyl.
Russia took control of a nuclear power plant in Southern Ukraine on March 4. The plant was still under the control of Russian troops according to the latest reports.
Nuclear experts were upset by the military's invasion of nuclear sites.
Several people told Insider that the risk of a nuclear accident in Ukraine remained low, but that the military activity in the country made it riskier.
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