A large convoy containing between 200 and 250 Libyan armoured vehicles has crossed into Niger, according to the Reuters news agency.
French and Niger military sources told the agency that the convoy, escorted by the Niger army, arrived in the northern desert town of Agadez on Monday.
The French military source said he had been told Muammar Gaddafi and his son Saif al-Islam might be considering joining the convoy en route to Burkina Faso, a landlocked West African state which has offered Gaddafi and his family asylum and has a border with Niger.
Mansour El Kikhia, chair of the political science department at the University of Texas, spoke to Al Jazeera about the implications if Gaddafi was in the convoy.
