The director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency says inspectors need to visit a nuclear plant in the middle of a war zone. Rafael Grossi and his team are in Ukraine to assess the damage to the site in Zaporizhzhia. But he recognizes getting there will be "extremely complex."

Ukraine's presidential adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said Russian troops are deliberately shelling routes to the plant. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy outlined his concerns to Grossi in Kyiv on Tuesday. He said Russian troops need to pull out.

Zelenskyy said, "All the leaders of Europe and the world support the demilitarization of the station, the withdrawal of Russian troops and their weapons, and the liberation of our station."

Russian defense officials said they are ready to cooperate but not to pull out. They accused Ukrainian artillery of firing two shells around the plant and said their troops have inflicted heavy casualties in the latest fighting. They said they killed more than 1,200 Ukrainian soldiers in one day.

However, Ukrainian troops have pounded targets in a counteroffensive across the south. Officers in the Kherson region say they have broken through Russian defenses. They say a liberation of the area is "coming soon."