Henk Slebos, who befriended Pakistani nuclear scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan while they were students at Delft in western Holland in the 1960s, was convicted of illegally exporting strategic goods by a court in Alkmaar.

He was also ordered to personally pay a fine of 100,000 euros (xxx dollars) and two of his companies were fined for at total of 97,500 euros.

The prosecution last month had asked that Slebos be sentenced to 18 months in prison and fined 100,000 euros.

He has not denied the shipments of equipment for uranium enrichment, but he denied the exports were illegal, saying that was a matter of opinion, in a documantary aired on Dutch public television in early November.

"The court blames the accused for breaking the rules meant to stop the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction," the court said in press release.

An accomplice of Slebos, Zoran Filipovic, was sentenced to 180 hours of community service and a 5,000 euro-fine for illegally exporting strategic goods.

In 1983, Khan was convicted in absentia to four years in jail for stealing secrets relating to uranium enrichment while working at Urenco, a Dutch enrichment facility.

The verdict was overturned two years later on a technicality and the Dutch government declined to pursue the matter.

In January 2004, Khan admitted passing on nuclear technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea, and was pardoned by Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf.

All rights reserved. © 2005 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.