Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, March 30, 1990 TAG: 9003300039
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
The alleged role of Al-Qaqaa State Establishment in the export scheme was laid out in the indictment against five people and two companies.
The indictment was unsealed in San Diego. Two of the five people named in it were arrested in London Wednesday. The three others were identified as Al-Qaqaa engineers and are believed to be in Iraq, authorities said.
The indictment says that, in discussions with an undercover agent, the Iraqis did not specifically say the triggers would be used to detonate nuclear warheads. But they insisted on design specifications "that left nothing to the imagination," said John Kelley, who directs the U.S. Customs Service's strategic exports unit.
Kelley said the Iraqis also expressed an interest in obtaining other components of timing devices for the warheads.
The prospect of nuclear-warhead triggers being sold to Iraq "is not only illegal, it is a very frightening situation we are dealing with," Customs Commissioner Carol Hallett said.
The indictment, returned last month by a federal grand jury, charges that Euromac (London) Ltd., and Atlas Equipment (U.K.) Ltd. acted on behalf of the Iraqi government to illegally obtain the devices.
Hallett said Euromac was a purchasing agent for the Iraqi government and "had done millions of dollars worth of business" in buying arms during that country's war with Iran.
The indictment followed an 18-month undercover investigation conducted by U.S. and British customs agents.
The indictment's description of Iraq's alleged role in the scheme contradicts denials by Iraqi officials that their government is seeking to develop a nuclear arsenal.
The State Department called in Iraq's ambassador, Mohamed Al-Mashat, on Thursday to register U.S. concern on that point.
"We do not foresee a near-time Iraqi nuclear capability," spokesman Richard Boucher said. "However, we remain concerned about the danger."
Adding to U.S. worry was Iraqi testing in December of a Soviet-made Scud missile that could lead to a longer-range rocket capable of reaching Israel, U.S. officials said.
The ambassador denied on Wednesday that his country is trying to develop nuclear weapons. He said all Iraqi nuclear facilities were subject to international inspection under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
Still, spokesman Boucher said "the arrest of the Iraqis in London raises once again the administration's deep concern about proliferation in the Middle East."
Iraq has a nuclear facility near Baghdad that Israel bombed in 1981.
The indictment said Ali Ashour Daghir, who was ordered held without bond in London, was managing director of the companies. Jeanine Speckman, who was released on bail after her appearance in a British court, was accused of being an executive for the companies who negotiated to buy the triggers.
The companies and the five people are accused of conspiring to export the warhead-detonation capacitors made by CSI Technologies Inc., of San Marcos, Calif., without obtaining export licenses for them from the State Department, as required by U.S. law.
The defendants also are charged with money laundering in the alleged transfer of $10,500 from Britain to CSI's account with the Bank of America in Escondido, Calif.
The indictment was returned Feb. 23 and amended with an additional charge last week. The Al-Qaqaa engineers charged in it are Karim Dhaidas Omran, Dafir Al-Azawi and Wallid Issa Ahmad.
Al-Qaqaa is a weapons development unit of Iraq's Ministry of Industry and Military Industrialization, the indictment said.
It was not immediately clear when, and if, the defendants in Britain could be extradited. Hallett conceded there was "little likelihood" the three engineers believed to be in Iraq would ever be arrested.
The indictment charges the conspiracy began in September 1988, when the two British companies contacted a London representative of CSI about obtaining the detonators. Hallett said the company immediately notified Customs agents and cooperated in an undercover operation. A Customs agent posing as a CSI executive joined the negotiations last fall in London, the indictment said.
by CNB