The deals were signed between 2016 and 2019, and the first was reportedly extended in the summer of 2019.The outlet described the projects as limited in size and scope.The IAEA has repeatedly publicly declared its commitment to Ukraine's territorial integrity, urging Russia to withdraw from Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, the largest nuclear power station in Europe, which has been under Russian occupation since March 2022.In a statement to RFE/RL, the IAEA said that the agency continues to recognize Crimea as part of Ukraine. It described its studies on the occupied territory as being of a "purely technical nature" and said they "do not constitute any change in the agency's position on the status of Crimea."The IAEA representative also called the counterpart of one of the projects, the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research (JINR), an international research center based in Moscow Oblast, "not a Russian organization but an International Intergovernmental Scientific Research Organization located in Russia.