[pvg]

You wrote "Initially there was a flat out denial that anything happened at all, but once the scale of the catastrophe became clear (within about a day)". That's not what happened, you can look it up in any of the numerous timelines and accounts of the accident and the reporting and Soviet disclosures. The evacuation of Pripyat started before the first public Soviet announcement as described here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_disaster#Evacuation

And the section immediately following regarding the announcement.

[0xbear]

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/...

[linkregister]

Maybe it's been edited since you supplied the wikipedia link, but it doesn't support your narrative.

One page down, it describes Ukrainian Soviet officials claiming there was no danger from the accident to regional Ukrainian SSR officials. It says that Pripyat was only evacuated 24 hours after the disaster, after more than 50 residents were hospitalized for radiation poisoning.

Even then, the letter to the residents was that the evacuation was temporary, and primarily as a precautionary measure.

The only thing you effectively refute is the timeline, Pripyat was evacuated 24, not 36 hours later, as the parent poster erroneously stated.

The wikipedia article doesn't mention internal Soviet press releases, so you haven't refuted that Ukrainian or Russian officials denied a disaster. However, the parent poster nor the OP haven't demonstrated that officials lied to the public either.

[0xbear]

Proof: Soviet TV as of April 26. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=EdubXu5GYxA

“And this is the main building of the station itself. As you can see there is no major destruction incessantly touted by the Western press...”

[pvg]

This isn't from April 26th 1986. How can it possibly be, the 'Western press' didn't know about the accident then. It's also not a 'flat out denial anything had happened at all', you're just misremembering that part.