Almost all Russian staff pulled from Iran's Bushehr nuclear plant

Russia has withdrawn almost all its staff from Iran's sole nuclear power plant, built and operated with help from Moscow, the head of Russia's atomic energy agency said Monday.

"We began the final rotation at the Bushehr station," Alexei Likhachev said, adding that 108 people were evacuated while just 20 - top managers and those responsible for equipment safety - remained at the station.

Russia began evacuating its staff from the plant due to the threat of airstrikes amid the US-Israeli war on Iran.

Moscow has warned that attacks near the plant risked a "radiological disaster more devastating than Chernobyl".

The Bushehr facility is located in the south of Iran and equipped with a 1,000-megawatt reactor.

The area around it has been struck at least four times during the war.

Earlier this month, an attack saw one person - a guard at the facility - killed, but did not damage the plant itself, according to Iranian state media and the International Atomic Energy Agency's analysis of satellite imagery of the site.

Russia offers to take in Iran's enriched uranium

Separately on Monday, the Kremlin said Russia was ready to take in Iran's enriched uranium as part of a future peace deal with the United States.

Failed talks between Iran and the United States over the weekend dashed hopes of a swift deal to permanently end the war that has killed thousands and thrown the global economy into turmoil since it began in late February.

Russia, which possesses the world's largest stockpile of nuclear weapons, has repeatedly offered to host Iran's enriched uranium as part of any peace deal.

"This proposal was voiced by President Putin in contacts with both the United States and regional states. The offer still stands, but has not been acted upon," the Kremlin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Monday in response to a question by AFP.

The Kremlin also criticised Trump's threat to blockade the Strait of Hormuz, a key waterway that has been at a standstill since the US and Israel began striking Iran in late February.

"Such actions will likely continue to negatively impact the international market," Peskov said.