The engineers were involved in a joint project to launch communication satellites on missiles fired from an oil rig, the sources said after Bloomberg News Service broke the story.

The justice department, officials said, continues to investigate Boeing to determine whether there were criminal violations of arms export laws in the information transfer. The US wants collaboration with Russia, China and other countries for space launches but it zealously protects the technological advantages it has against competitors while collaborating with them in certain areas for economic reasons or reasons of convenience.

Although state and defence department officials concluded that the materials passed to the Russians and Ukrainians did not damage national security, thecase was sent to the justice department to determine if prosecution is warranted.

In all, officials said, there were 207 documented violations by Boeing employees, most involving delivery of information, defence articles and services without first getting approval from state or defence department officials.

A justice department source told the Post that prosecution of Boeing is "doubtful." In part because the company informed the state department of the violations after an internal investigation.

Boeing is the second major US company involved in satellite launch business to be investigated by the justice department for possible export law violations. Loral, a major US manufacturer of communication satellites, also turned over to the state department an internal investigation of its employees' possible unauthorised transfer of technical data in the 1996 post-accident report that triggered a New York Federal grand jury inquiry.

The beneficiary of that technology transfer by Loral was China, whichhad suffered several launch accidents before the transfer. After the transfer, its launches have been perfect. A house committee organised last summer to investigate Clinton administration's handling of satellite export and launch policies with China and other countries met behind closed doors on Saturday.

Sources told the Post that the panel's investigators have recently directed their attention at overseas sales of supercomputers and other equipment that could help terrorist countries develop weapons of mass destruction.