Nuclear aspirations? Muammar Gaddafi
Photo: AP
Libya says will sign nuclear power deal with US
Agreement to include building nuclear power plant 'for peaceful purposes,' helping develop water desalination capacity, joint research and technical projects and training Libyan technicians in the United States, North African country’s official news agency reports
The United States will help Libya generate nuclear electricity, the North African country said on Monday, in an announcement appearing to herald a further improvement in ties with the West.
There was no immediate comment from Washington, which has been repairing ties with Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi since he began a series of moves in 2003 aimed at ending decades of international isolation for his oil and gas exporting country.
Libya's official Jana news agency said an agreement between the two countries would be signed shortly.
It would include building a nuclear power plant, helping develop water desalination capacity, joint research and technical projects and training Libyan technicians in the United States.
"The General People's Committee authorized on Sunday the General People's Committee for Liaison and International Cooperation to sign the agreement related to Libyan-American cooperation in the peaceful use of nuclear energy," Jana said, referring to Libya's equivalent of a cabinet and foreign ministry respectively.
'Wasteful era'
In 2003 Libya promised to give up nuclear, chemical and biological weapons, but Gaddafi said at the time that he still hoped to develop a nuclear program for peaceful purposes.
Washington has voiced hopes that Iran and North Korea will follow Libya's example.
But on March 3 Gaddafi renewed a recent complaint that Western countries had failed to properly compensate Libya for scrapping its nuclear arms program and as a result countries like Iran and North Korea would not follow his lead.
Libya in 2003 ended years of international estrangement by accepting responsibility and starting to pay compensation for the bombing of airliners over Scotland and Niger in 1988 and 1989.
The US government said in May 2006 it would restore formal ties with Libya and take it off the list of countries deemed state sponsors of terrorism.
Gaddafi said last year the era in which Libya had helped "revolutionary" groups overseas was over since it was wasteful. Gaddafi also said Libya had come close to building a nuclear bomb in its weapons of mass destruction program.
Fears over finite oil and gas supplies and climate change have pushed nuclear power into the limelight as a way of producing energy and cutting emissions of carbon dioxide, blamed for global warming.
Libya has proven oil reserves of 39 billion barrels, enough for 60 years at current production rates. Its largely unexploited gas reserves are estimated at 53 trillion cubic feet.
