Gadhafi comes clean

Published 9:00 pm Friday, December 19, 2003

WASHINGTON — Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, after secret negotiations with the United States and Britain, agreed to halt his nation’s drive to develop nuclear and chemical weapons and the long-range missiles to deliver them, President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair said Friday. Bush said pointedly, "I hope other leaders will find an example" in the action.

Libya’s most significant acknowledgment was that it had a program intended to enrich uranium for use in nuclear weapons, a senior Bush administration official said.

Libya’s nuclear effort was more advanced than previously thought, the official said. U.S. and British experts inspected components of a centrifuge program to enrich the uranium, though the system was not operational, the official said.

Blair, speaking from Durham, Britain, and Bush, addressing reporters in the White House briefing room, described a process of nine months of secret talks and onsite inspections, initiated by the long reviled Libyan leader shortly after he agreed to a settlement in the 1988 bombing of a Pan Am jet over Lockerbie, Scotland.

In the decision announced Friday by all sides, Libya agreed to disclose all its weapons of mass destruction and related programs and to open the country to international weapons inspectors to oversee their elimination

"Colonel Gadhafi’s commitment, once it is fulfilled, will make our country more safe and the world more peaceful," said Bush.

Teams of American and British experts went to Libya in October and December, the Bush administration official said.

They visited 10 sites related to Libya’s nuclear program, the official said.

Libyan officials also showed the American and British team a significant amount of mustard agent, a World War I-era chemical weapon. Libya made the material more than a decade ago, and also had bombs that could be filled with the substance for use in combat, the official said.

Libya also acknowledged having chemicals that could be used to make nerve agent, the official said.

The U.S. official described little evidence of a Libyan biological program.

Libyan officials further acknowledged contacts with North Korea, a supplier of long-range ballistic missiles, and provided the U.S.-British team access to missile research and development facilities.

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