LONDON — The International Atomic Energy Agency has confirmed the
disappearance of Libyan nuclear weapons plans.
IAEA said documents regarding a nuclear production plant, including information on nuclear weapon design, have gone
missing in Libya. An agency report said boxes of plans for the production of
a plutonium fuel facility could not be found and that the information had been in electronic form as well.
"Libya has been unable to explain where these plans are," an agency
source said.
The report, distributed to members of the IAEA's board of governors on
Sept. 12, said the proposed Libyan plant was meant to produce 10 kilograms
of plutonium per year, Middle East Newsline reported.
The report, the first on Libya since 2004, said the
plans were bought from the network led by Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer
Khan, which operated in 12 countries, including Iran, South Korea, Turkey
and the United Arab Emirates.
Also In This Edition
"Much of the sensitive information coming from the network existed in
electronic form, enabling easier use and dissemination," the report said.
"This includes information relating disturbingly to nuclear weapons design.
A substantial amount of sensitive information related to the fabrication of
a nuclear weapon was available to members of the network."
The missing nuclear plans represented one of several questions regarding
Libya's nuclear weapons program, renounced by Tripoli in 2003. The agency,
reporting contacts since 1984, said Tripoli lied about its relationship with
the Khan network.
The agency said inspectors verified all of the nuclear material reported
by Libya. But the report could not rule out that Libya was still concealing
nuclear material and activities.