[silverleaf]

Remember that 100 tons remaining from Iraq's previous purchase of Nigerien yellowcake was in Iraq and subject to UN/US nonproliferation team monitoring

If Saddam planned to continue his program to build the first "arab" nuke, perhaps in a willing 3rd country not son intensely watched as Iraq. If so Iraq needed a fresh supply of ore. Nigerien ore could be shipped to warehouses in Benin and from there loaded on freighters for ports unknown...

The US state department africanists were also quite smug that French controls over the ore mines would never allow this to happen (French businessmen corruptible? sacre bleu!)
Of course the Brit expats in the African mine business who were the sources of the original story knew better who and what could be bought from starving Nigeriens, for what price, than some desk clerk at Foggy Bottom

After the Wilson frappe a visit by the UN to Niger discovered the ore being shipped for days through the desert in convoys guarded by two Nigeriens with rifles...who knows if there was any security over the cargo at night when the trucks stopped in towns along the way for the drivers and guards to drink and sleep...the UN recommended better security of ore shipments.

[lepton]

Remember that 100 tons remaining from Iraq's previous purchase of Nigerien yellowcake was in Iraq and subject to UN/US nonproliferation team monitoring

That's the batch!