Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi has recruited some 800 Tuareg separatist fighters from Niger, Mali, Algeria and Burkina Faso to quash a popular uprising against his regime, security sources said today.

"Eight hundred Tuareg originating from Mali, Algeria and Burkina Faso have been recruited by Libya to fight on Gaddafi's side," a Malian security source told AFP.

"We have the same information," said a Niger security source, adding that among the 800, only a "small handful are from Algeria and Burkina Faso."

"The troops are mainly made up of Malian and Niger Tuareg," she said.

In Mali, a small, discreet recruitment office has been set up in a Bamako hotel belonging to Libya where a Libyan diplomat acts as a recruiting agent, an AFP journalist witnessed.

But security sources said recruitment was also taking place in parts of the Sahel.

"Those who are leaving now are tempted by the easy earnings. It is they who we call mercenaries," said Abdou Salam Ag Assalat, president of the Kidal Regional Assembly in north-eastern Mali.

"Among these youths there are former Malian and Niger Tuareg rebels who took up arms in Mali in 2006 and 2008," he added.

The Tuareg community is composed of some 1.5 million people spread across Algeria, Burkina Faso, Libya, Mali and Niger. Tuareg rebels have fought the authorities in Mali and Niger sporadically since the 1990s.