By Jonathan Marcus BBC defence correspondent

Weapons inspectors in Iraq have found what they said were warheads, capable of carrying chemical weapons.

On the face of it, even though the chemical munitions were empty, this is a troubling find.

Hossam Mohammad Amin said Iraq had declared the warheads

But things in the world of weapons inspection are seldom clear and already a controversy is raging around this handful of metal canisters.

A statement from the United Nations inspection team speaks of the warheads being "discovered" at the Ukhaider ammunition storage area south of Baghdad.

But the Iraqi authorities say that these weapons were declared in the documents that they sent to the UN last December.

That voluminous collection of material will now no doubt be rechecked by the UN.

Iraq's claim should be clarified one way or another.

If undeclared, this discovery will add some strength to British and US Government claims that Iraq is still hiding elements of a chemical weapons programme.

	:	Iraq Weapons
Iraqi chemical and biological weapons

The US Central Intelligence Agency, for example, believes that large numbers of 122-millimetre artillery rockets - Iraq's favoured means of delivering chemical munitions - are still unaccounted for.

The empty warheads discovered by the inspectors in this latest find could be for just such systems.

The warheads, though small in number, are said to be in good condition.

Not a 'smoking gun'

So far, the UN inspectors are refusing to speculate on the significance of this discovery.

Are these warheads representative of much larger numbers that are still secreted away, or are they just a handful of empty canisters perhaps missed by earlier inspections, or indeed, now declared by the Iraqis?

Without more information it is hard to make any real assessment of their significance.

On their own, they probably do not comprise that "smoking gun" that the British and Americans are eager for the inspectors to find.

But they may well be viewed by London and Washington as yet more evidence of a wider pattern of Iraqi infringements and other suspect activities that raise many questions, but where there seem to be few answers.

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