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A Nuclear Standoff with Libya

(Atlantic Monthly) Max Fisher - In November 2009, six years after the government of Libya first agreed to disarm its nuclear weapons program, Libyan nuclear workers wheeled the last of their country's highly enriched uranium out in front of the Tajoura nuclear facility, just east of Tripoli, to ship this final batch of weapons-grade nuclear material to Russia, where it would be treated and destroyed. On November 20, the day before the plane was to leave for Russia, Libyan officials unexpectedly halted the shipment. For one month and one day, U.S. and Russian diplomats negotiated with Libya for the uranium to be flown out of the country. On December 21, Libya finally allowed a Russian plane to remove the casks, ending Libya's low-grade game of nuclear blackmail. The month-long crisis, never revealed by the Obama administration or reported in the press, is recorded in U.S. State Department documents obtained by The Atlantic.
2010-12-02 10:17:56
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