French Arrest at Least 4 in Space Program Spying

French police have arrested at least four people, including an engineer, suspected of spying for an unnamed foreign country on the European space program, the Interior Ministry said today.

A ministry spokeswoman said those arrested had been taken before an examining magistrate in the northwest port city of Rouen. She gave no further details.

5 or 6 Seized, Radio Says

French radio reported that five or six people had been seized by the DST counterespionage agency in connection with an important spy probe.

A spokesman for the European space consortium Arianespace said it had been informed by DST about the case, which he said involved passing rocket-motor secrets to a foreign power.

Motors for Europe’s Ariane rockets and for French missiles are manufactured at Vernon, between Paris and Rouen, by the state-owned Societe Europeenne de Propulsion.

“This is something serious. A judicial inquiry is under way,” the Arianespace spokesman said.

‘No. 1 Sensitive Spot’

“Vernon is a No. 1 sensitive spot as far as national defense is concerned,” he said.

The factory at Vernon makes a range of rocket motors used to power Ariane rockets carrying satellites launched from a jungle space center at Kourou, French Guiana.

A spokesman for Societe Europeenne de Propulsion had no immediate comment on the affair, saying only that the company had “extremely Draconian security measures.”

There was no official comment on when or where the group was arrested. Judicial sources in Rouen said six people appeared before a magistrate Wednesday, apparently in the same case.