Libya: UN Nuclear Watchdog Warns Tons of Uranium Missing in Libya

Dean Calma / IAEA / Flickr (CC BY 2.0)
Rafael Mariano Grossi, IAEA Director General, met with members of the African Group during a meeting at the agency headquarters in Vienna, Austria on November 7, 2022.
16 March 2023
Deutsche Welle (Bonn)

The IAEA has said tons of missing uranium "may present a radiological risk" and added that it has no idea who took it.

Roughly 2.5 tons of natural uranium are missing from a Libyan site, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said on Wednesday.

IAEA Director Rafael Grossi told the organization's member states that inspectors found 10 drums containing uranium ore "were not present as previously declared" at the unspecified location.

"The loss of knowledge about the present location of nuclear material may present a radiological risk, as well as nuclear security concerns," the statement to member states said.

The nuclear watchdog would carry out "further activities" to "clarify the circumstances of the removal of the nuclear material and its current location."

Turmoil in Libya

In 2003, Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi agreed to abandon a program to develop nuclear weapons.

Under the plan, Gadhafi allowed weapons inspectors into Libya.

The country has, however, been in turmoil since 2011, when Gadhafi was ousted and killed in a NATO-backed uprising.

Since then, political control has been split between an interim government in the capital of Tripoli and another in the country's east, backed by military strongman Khalifa Haftar.

The interim government was only supposed to last until an election scheduled for December 2021, but that has still not been held.

(AFP, Reuters)

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