Brussels: NATO said on Monday it is concerned about the possibility that thousands of portable surface-to-air missiles, previously in Muammar Gaddafi's army, are missing in Libya.
"It is a matter of concern if stockpiles of weapons are not properly controlled and monitored," Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said.
He was responding to a report that thousands of SAM-7 shoulder-launched, surface-to-air missiles allegedly disappeared after the defeat of loyalist forces by Libyan rebels supported by NATO air strikes.
On Sunday, the German news magazine Der Spiegel said that during a confidential briefing on September 26 for German lawmakers, NATO's top military officer, Adm Giampaolo Di Paola, said the alliance had lost track of at least 10,000 surface-to-air missiles from Libyan military depots.
The article cited Di Paola as saying he fears the missiles could turn up anywhere, "in Kenya or in Kunduz" province, Afghanistan, and that they could potentially pose a "serious danger to civil aviation."
A spokesman for Di Paola in Brussels said he could not confirm the report.
But Fogh Rasmussen said that since NATO did not have any troops on the ground it was the responsibility of the post-Gaddafi leadership, the National Transitional Council, to ensure that all weapons stocks are properly controlled and monitored. "Individual allies are in contact with the NTC to make sure they address this issue properly," he said.
Comments
0 comment