Secretary of State Colin Powell earlier called International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Mohamed ElBaradei for a briefing on his mission.

"We look forward to a thorough IAEA investigation of Libya's nuclear facilities and we also look forward to hearing what the IAEA found out on his visit to Libya," said State Department deputy spokesman Adam Ereli.

ElBaradei said that Libyan leader Moamer Kadhafi confirmed he has abandoned weapons of mass destruction.

Libya also said that the IAEA would be permitted to send UN inspectors to sensitive sites as if it had already signed the additional protocol to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, ElBaradei said.

Despite those announcements, Ereli said it was still too early to say for sure if Libya, a traditional US foe, was being sincere.

"I would caution anybody against rushing to any conclusions," he said.

"This is going to take a long time. It's not as a result of one visit that we are going to have a complete picture or be able to come to any final conclusions about Libya's programs."

The US and British governments were already working with the UN to work out how "best we can assist Libya in getting rid of those weapons programs which it has said it wants to get rid of," Ereli said.

A US team could leave here within the next few months, but it is not yet clear if they will go to Libya, or hold a first meeting with Libyan officials in a third country, a senior Bush administration official said.

Libya's announcement and ElBaradei's visit are the fruit of nine months of secret negotiations between Libya and diplomats from Britain and the United States which ended with Tripoli's dramatic pledge on December 19.

Libya still faces a range of US sanctions, and the latest move by the unpredictable Kadhafi was seen partly as a bid to get them removed.

The country was under international sanctions for years after the 1988 bombing of a US airliner over the Scottish town of Lockerbie that killed 270 people.

But the United Nations lifted its embargo in September after Tripoli agreed to pay 2.7 billion dollars (2.2 billion euros) in compensation and accept responsibility for the bombing but denied guilt.

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