Spy photo bid to defuse Iraq explosives row

The missing explosives row took a new twist today when the Pentagon released a spy satellite picture purporting to show Iraqis removing the munitions. Taken during the US invasion, the grainy image showed two lorries outside a bunker in the al Qaqaa complex where 380 tonnes of high explosives capable of detonating a nuclear bomb were stored.

The US administration declassified the picture, taken on 17 March last year, in a desperate attempt to defuse the row that has dominated the past four days of the US presidential election.

Democrat John Kerry has said the failure to secure the munitions was "one of the great blunders" of the war by the Bush administration.

Critics claim the new picture proves nothing because it does not show what the lorries were doing at the site.

In another dramatic claim, ABC News produced a video purporting to show the explosives were still at the complex after the US had taken control of the area.