Reply #64: Libya: US joins hunt for Col Gaddafi's missing missiles

[tabatha]

Jeffrey Feltman, the US assistant secretary of state and the most senior international visitor to arrive in Tripoli since the fall of Col Gaddafi, said Washington was concerned about the spread of both conventional and non-conventional weapons.

He said he had people working "quietly" with the National Transitional Council particularly on the hunt for surface-to-air missiles, of which more than 15,000 are said to be unaccounted for from Col Gaddafi's weapons dumps, and chemical weapon precursors.

"It's a potential risk not only to Libya but to the region," he said.

The rebel military official in charge of securing Tripoli International Airport told The Daily Telegraph yesterday his men were scouring an area of more than 30 kilometres for missing weapons.

The Libyan authorities and their western backers are nervous about allowing the airport to reopen to scheduled passenger flights until they can be sure there can be no threat from any SAMS still in the area. There is also the fear that they may be sold to terrorist groups who could use them to target civilian planes anywhere.

"The policy of Gaddafi was to scatter these missiles through civilian homes," the commander, Mukhtar al-Akdar, said. "We have great difficulty when we try to collect them as some of the local people are very pro-Gaddafi."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/libya/8763507/Libya-US-joins-hunt-for-Col-Gaddafis-missing-missiles.html