FBI still waiting to visit Benghazi consulate

FBI agents have still not been granted permission to visit the consulate building where the American ambassador to Libya was killed, three weeks after the attack by militants in the eastern city of Benghazi.

An FBI team was dispatched to Libya within days of the attack, in which three other Americans died. But they have been forced to remain in Tripoli as American and Libyan officials argue over the terms under which the two sides will co-operate.

The consulate building itself and the accommodation annexe which also came under attack have been left largely unsecured.

"We are getting ready for the FBI team to go to Benghazi and meet with our team, start joint investigations," the deputy foreign minister, Mohammed Abdel Aziz, said on Tuesday.

Benghazi's chief prosecutor, Saleh Adam Mohammed, told the Daily Telegraph more than two weeks ago that he was expecting the FBI team to arrive within two days, and said the Libyan authorities fully intended to co-operate with their American counterparts. There has been as yet no explanation for the delay.