The Austrian Central Bank announced Tuesday it had frozen the assets of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi in the country.

"All the assets of persons who fall under the decision of the EU sanctions are frozen, and this applies to the Gaddafi family," the bank said, referring to a European Union decision Monday to impose an arms embargo and targeted sanctions on Libya.

The bank said that around 1.2 billion euros (about 1.7 billion US dollars) of Libyan deposits were currently in Austrian financial institutions. However, it was not clear now how much of that belonged to the Gaddafi family.

The United Nations, EU and several countries, including the United States and Canada, have imposed sanctions on Libya following violent clashes between the North African country's government and protesters.