Agence France Presse – German customs agents have discovered a network of entrepreneurs who were allegedly trying to buy material for the Iranian nuclear program, state prosecutors said Monday.
Some 250 agents raided 41 companies in 10 German states last week after learning of suspicious purchase requests by a Berlin firm, which is no longer in business, said the prosecutor’s office in Potsdam, near the German capital.
"This involves the Iranian atomic procurement program," a spokesman told ARD television.
"We have learned that the employees of this company approached companies in Germany in a targeted way to buy construction parts for Iran."
The searches revealed that six of the companies had done business with the Berlin company but only one of the firms, from the western state of Hesse, was under suspicion of violating export laws.
The prosecutor’s office said that the deliveries went from the Berlin company run by Russians to a company near Moscow, and from there to Iran.
The shipments included electronic parts and special cables. According to an ARD report, the Iranians had attempted to acquire hydraulic pumps and transformer parts in Germany.
A spokesman put the value of the deliveries at between two and three million euros (2.4 and 3.6 million dollars). Two million euros were seized in the raid of the Berlin business.
The UN nuclear watchdog has been investigating Iran since February 2003 on US accusations that Tehran is using its civilian nuclear power program to hide an atomic weapons program. Iran rejects the charges.
The export of material that could be used in a nuclear program is subject to strict regulations in Germany and must be approved by the authorities.
A German engineer went on trial this month accused of helping Libya’s attempts to develop nuclear weapons using technology supplied through the smuggling network of the disgraced Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan.
He faces up to 15 years in prison if found guilty by the court in the southwestern city of Mannheim.