"The Egyptian nuclear programme is clear, known and announced," presidential spokesman Magued Abdel Fattah told reporters.

"Nuclear sites in Egypt have been subjected to inspections (by the International Atomic Energy Agency)," he added, saying that Egypt's latest inspection was just a month ago and it underwent another three months ago.

"Egypt applies the principal of total transparency ... What has been written in certain media is just an attempt to pressurise international employees into not saying on," he added.

The accusations stemmed from a report in the French newspaper Liberation, citing unnamed Western diplomats, that the now dismantled Libyan nuclear programme "had Egyptian links."

Liberation said the charges were reaching IAEA head Mohamed ElBaradei who it said stood accused by some diplomatic missions of using his influence to put the brakes on the agency examining the issue.

Egypt's ambassador to the UN atomic agency had last week blasted the report as "totally baseless".

Egypt is believed to possess two small nuclear reactors used purely for research purposes.

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