German prosecutors said on Wednesday they have charged two men for exporting equipment to Iran intended for use in making long-range missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads. Iranian citizen Mohsen A., 52, and German-Iranian engineer Behzad S., 49, teamed up to buy from an unnamed German firm a furnace used in making warheads and missile guidance systems heat resistant, federal prosecutors said.
Both men, who were formally charged on March 24 with breaching an EU and US embargo on such materials, "knew that the equipment was meant to be used in the Iranian missile programme," prosecutors said in a statement. The United States and European Union suspect that Iran wants to develop nuclear weapons, an accusation Tehran denies.
"Iran has been developing since the late 1990s long-range missiles to carry weapons of mass destruction," prosecutors said. The furnace was then shipped to Iran and in March 2008 the German firm began to install it. They stopped work however after learning that Mohsen A. was suspected of working for the Iranian government. Mohsen A. was arrested in October following a series of raids at commercial and private premises around Germany, and remains in custody, prosecutors said. Rehzad S. is currently a free man.
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