Weapons smuggled from Libya after the collapse of Moammar Gadhafi's government are flowing through the surrounding region, the president of the west African nation of Niger said Friday, a development that threatens to destabilize a swath of the continent already struggling against ethnic unrest and a regional branch of al Qaeda.

"Arms were stolen in Libya and are being disseminated all over the region," President Mahamadou Issoufou told reporters following a meeting with South Africa's President Jacob Zuma. "Saharan countries...