(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-01-18 19:13

Madrid  -- The CIA was worried late Spanish dictator Francisco Franco might develop nuclear weapons in the 1970s, according to declassified documents cited by Spanish newspaper El Pais on Friday.

"Spain is the one European country that is deserving of some attention as a possible proliferator in the years ahead," a declassified 1974 CIA report published on El Pais's website said.

The report, made available by the National Security Archive of George Washington University in Washington, DC, drew attention to Spain's extensive nuclear power programme, a pilot enrichment plant and the fact the country had refused to sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Donato Fuejo, a former head of Spain's Nuclear Security Council, told El Pais that Franco did have nuclear ambitions.

"I'm not surprised the CIA kept an eye on the (nuclear) plans, because Franco and some of his military dreamed about it," said Fuejo, now 81. "I don't know what would have happened if the dictatorship had continued."

"The idea was that Spain should become a great power and move up to the level of France and the United Kingdom."

Franco died in 1975. Nuclear power provides 16 percent of the country's electricity, but the country no longer has nuclear weapons ambitions.

The CIA thought Spain would develop nuclear weapons only in an "unlikely combination of circumstances" arising from its proximity to disputed British colony Gibraltar, Portugal and North Africa, a possible cessation of US military ties or uncertainty following the death of Franco.