London ? Iraq could deploy nerve gas and anthrax weapons within 45 minutes of an order from President Saddam Hussein or his son, and it has been seeking to purchase uranium from Africa on the black market to build a nuclear bomb, according to a British intelligence dossier released Tuesday by Prime Minister Tony Blair.

The 50-page dossier contends that Iraq has produced germ warfare agents in mobile laboratories and restarted its nuclear weapons program after U.N. inspectors left the country in 1998.

It states that current U.N. sanctions are hindering Iraq’s efforts to obtain enriched uranium needed to build a nuclear weapon. But if U.N. sanctions were broken, the report says, it would take Iraq between one and two years to build a bomb if it obtained fissile material and other essential components from foreign sources, and at least five years to produce enough fissile material of its own.

That assessment is more conservative than some U.S. analysis of Iraq’s nuclear program. President Bush, for instance, has said that Iraq could build a bomb within a year if it acquired fissile material.

Britain is the closest U.S. ally in the confrontation with Iraq, and Blair has frequently acted as the two countries’ international voice. He took Tuesday’s dossier to a contentious special session of the British Parliament, but the televised speech also served as an appeal to the world at large.

Produced by Britain’s top-secret Joint Intelligence Committee, the dossier contains no dramatic revelations, experts said, but gives new intriguing details, such as the 45-minute window, about the Iraqi weapons programs. It generally does not disclose sources. But Blair’s attribution to the JIC is unprecedented, officials said.

Though the report documents continuing efforts, analysts said, it suggests that Iraq would find it difficult to wage sustained, large-scale war with weapons of mass destruction.

The report “doesn’t try to make the case that Iraq is on the verge of acquiring nuclear weapons or long-range missiles,” said Gary Samore, an American weapons expert and the editor of a report issued earlier this month by the International Institute for Strategic Studies. “But when you put the whole together, it does provide convincing information to support the argument that Iraq is pursuing weapons of mass destruction and the long-range missiles to deliver them.”

A senior Iraqi official called the dossier “scaremongering, exaggeration and lies.”