A-Bomb Triggers for Iraq Seized in London : Nuclear weapons: A U.S.-British sting operation intercepts 40 devices being smuggled from California.

U.S. and British agents in London seized 40 Iraq-bound nuclear bomb triggers that had been smuggled out of Southern California, officials said Wednesday. Six people, including two Iraqi nationals, were arrested.

The raid on a cargo hangar at Heathrow Airport climaxed an extraordinary international sting operation that began in San Diego 18 months ago, authorities said.

“It was a sting all the way,” said one State Department source.

“We’ve stopped some very serious business from going forward,” said U.S. Customs Commissioner Carol Hallett.

Neither Hallett nor other American or British officials would discuss the operation in any detail. It was not clear if the triggers were sought by the Iraqi government or if that nation has developed nuclear weapons capability. Nor did officials explain what had prompted the investigation.

At the White House, President Bush said in a statement that the arrests underscored his “deep concern about the issue of nuclear proliferation in the Middle East.”

The President added: “We again call upon nuclear suppliers to exercise special restraint in providing materials related to the development of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons and intermediate-range missiles in the volatile area.

“Furthermore, we urge all states in the area to adhere to the non-proliferation treaty. Iraq is a signatory of that treaty. Iraqi officials are well aware of our views on nuclear proliferation, which we have made clear on several occasions.”

A sealed indictment in the case has been returned in federal court in San Diego and may be unsealed today, sources said.

According to an NBC News report, CSI Technologies Inc. of San Marcos, near San Diego, alerted officials to an attempt by two Iraqis to buy the sophisticated electronic devices used to trigger nuclear weapons. CSI executives could not be reached Wednesday for comment.

A second U.S. firm, EG&G; of Wellesley, Mass., said late Wednesday that it, too, had been cooperating with authorities.

EG&G;’s president, Donald M. Kerr, said in a statement that the firm had provided customs agents with more than 40 inoperable trigger devices, known as krytrons, apparently for use as decoys in the sting.

EG&G;, which has a sales office in San Diego, is the only domestic manufacturer of the devices, which are strictly controlled by the U.S. government. Such devices generally are acquired at advanced stages in the production of nuclear weapons, nuclear experts said.

EG&G; is a major contractor for the Department of Energy, which is responsible for producing nuclear weapons for the nation’s arsenal. EG&G; also runs the department’s Nevada Test Site and its facilities at Rocky Flats in Colorado, the Idaho National Engineering Laboratory in Idaho Falls and the Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Fla.

Sources said that a crate containing the EG&G; trigger devices was shipped to London earlier this month aboard a TWA plane out of Los Angeles International Airport. At Heathrow, the crate was stored at a TWA cargo depot for several days. Authorities moved in as the container was about to be loaded onto an Iraqi Airways flight bound for Baghdad, sources said.

In a statement, Britain’s Customs and Excise Department named three of those arrested as Ali Daghir, 49, a company director with dual Iraqi and British nationality; Lebanese engineer Toufic Fouad Amyuni, 37; and export executive Jeanine Celestine Speckman, 41, a Frenchwoman married to a Briton. The other three people arrested were not identified either by British or U.S. officials.

NBC News identified Daghir as the main suspect and said he allegedly posed in London as an importer of frozen french fries from the United States.

The Associated Press reported from London that British authorities said they had also arrested Iraqi national Omar Latif, who was immediately served with a deportation order, and a Cypriot with a British passport who was released after questioning. The Home Office said Latif was being deported because of “attempted breaches of legislation governing the export of strategic goods from the United Kingdom.” The Iraqi ambassador was summoned to the Foreign Office and informed of the expulsion order.

It was unclear if Daghir or Latif had any ties to the Iraqi government.

“We are deferring (on the release of any details) to the British government at their request, due to the extreme sensitivity to Iraq,” said U.S. Customs spokesman Dennis Shimkoski.

He was referring to the execution in Baghdad two weeks ago of Farzad Bazoft, a British-based journalist convicted of espionage.

The President’s concerns were echoed by experts in nuclear proliferation.

“This just points out the shortcomings in the international system, which isn’t going to catch them every time,” said Deborah Holland, issues director for the Nuclear Control Institute, a Washington-based organization that studies terrorism and nuclear proliferation.

Gary Milhollin, director of the Washington-based Wisconsin Project on Nuclear Arms Control, said the incident has significant implications.

“The first thing it means is that a country which has joined the non-proliferation treaty (Iraq) has violated it by trying to make the bomb,” Milhollin said. “The device they were trying to import secretly obviously was intended to make a nuclear weapon. So they have been caught red-handed in violation of this treaty.”

Times staff writers Douglas Frantz, David Lauter and Robin Wright in Washington and Alan Abrahamson in San Diego contributed to this story.

IRAQI SMUGGLING PLOT ABORTED USA: Nuclear weapon triggers go from California to New York to Britain. Heathrow Airport: Triggers found in cargo shed. Several suspects arrested. Baghdad: In 1981 Israel destroyed nuclear power station which it alleged would produce nuclear weapons.