Agence France-Presse,
LONDON: Libya is stalling on a 2003 pledge to dispose of its uranium, with nearly 200 barrels of the material still in its hands, The Daily Telegraph reported on Monday.
Citing unnamed sources close to the situation, the newspaper said that the uranium is in the form of yellow cake ore and is being stored at a military base in the town of Sabha.
It is worth about 200 million pounds (295 million euros, 404 million dollars), according to the Telegraph.
Libya abandoned its nuclear weapons programme in 2003 in return for the lifting of Western sanctions, and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was supposed to oversee the disposal of uranium.
“(Libyan leader Colonel Moamer) Kadhafi has gone through the pro forma process with the IAEA but he has delayed and delayed,” a source told the paper.
“He wants to use the uranium as a bargaining chip to get a reactor.”
Last month, France and Libya signed a controversial memorandum of understanding to build a Libyan nuclear reactor for water desalination among a raft of deals.
