Gadhafi is expected to make his first state visit in over two decades outside the Middle East and Africa

VIENNA, January 16 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - Senior U.S. and British officials are to meet in Vienna Monday, January 19, with the U.N. nuclear watchdog to discuss monitoring Libya's promise to dismantle its weapons of mass destruction programs, Vienna-based diplomats said Friday, January 16.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich announced Friday that Libyan leader Moamer Gadhafi will pay an official visit to Ukraine this year, his first outside the Middle East and Africa since 1989.

The diplomats did not provide details about the Vienna Monday meeting but said there were unconfirmed reports that the U.S. administration's point man for non-proliferation, undersecretary of state for arms control and international security John Bolton, would be coming, according to Agence France-Presse (AFP).

Inspectors from the U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), as well as the United States and Britain have visited Libya since the country made a surprise announcement last month, following secret talks with London and Washington, that it had agreed to dismantle its programs to develop weapons of mass destruction (WMD).

Officials at the Vienna-based IAEA refused to comment Friday on any specifics.

But IAEA spokesman Mark Gwozdecky told AFP: "We are coordinating closely with the British, U.S. and other governments to ensure a common understanding on our respective operational roles with regard to Libya's implementation of its bilateral and international commitments for the elimination of its WMD and related capabilities.

"Discussions are continuing over the coming days," Gwozdecky said.

IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei visited Libya in December to kick off agency inspections and Gwozdecky said new IAEA teams would be visiting Libya in January.

A Western diplomat said the teams would leave next week.

The United States, which has not had an Embassy in Libya since the 1980s, is considering setting up an office to give the inspectors logistical, technical and secretarial support.

The IAEA, which is monitoring Iran's atomic program and did this in Iraq as well until the war and U.S. occupation there, is clearly concerned about maintaining its role as the international community's agency for nuclear issues worldwide.

A diplomat in the Austrian capital said there were "hurt feelings" at the IAEA when the United States and Britain surprised the world, and the agency, with the agreement they won from Tripoli to abandon biological, chemical and nuclear weapons programs.

The IAEA wants to keep its role "as the sole agency monitoring nuclear proliferation," the diplomat added to AFP.

"They don't want to be excluded. They want to perpetuate themselves as an organization," he said.

Officials in Vienna have refused to reveal details of the upcoming meeting, although it is believed it will focus on coordinating the U.S., British and IAEA roles in monitoring Libya's WMD programs.

Last Saturday, Saif al-Islam Gadhafi, a son of the Libyan leader, told the Arabic satellite television station Al-Jazeera that talks with the United States and Britain on WMD programs "finished months ago".

"The only thing left now are the routine steps to be undertaken by international organizations on the ground," he told the station in a live interview from Tripoli.

Gadhafi To Visit Ukraine

Meanwhile, Gadhafi was declared to be set to return a rare visit to Libya last October by Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma.

Khadafi last traveled outside the Middle East and Africa in 1989 when he attended a non-aligned summit in Belgrade.

Yanukovich, who was quoted by Interfax news agency, said that Libyan Prime Minister Prime Minister Shukri Ghanem was expected in Kiev in April to prepare Gadhafi's visit.

The visit was announced following talks in Kiev between Yanukovich and a top Gadhafi aide, Saleh Bashir who made a joint call for closer bilateral economic cooperation in the energy, farming and aviation fields.

Tripoli is said to have an interest in purchasing Ukrainian Antonov An-140 and An-148 jetliners.

In the same context, Ukraine's state Naftogaz energy company was granted a concession in October to exploit four Libyan oil fields.