German firms smuggled nuclear material to Iran: prosecutor

afp ^ | 7/12/07 | afp

[Flavius]

POTSDAM, Germany (AFP) - German prosecutors on Thursday said they are investigating some 50 companies suspected of smuggling technology to Iran's Bushehr nuclear power plant via Russia. ADVERTISEMENT click here

Berlin-based company Vero is suspected of having smuggled material to build the nuclear reactor through Poland to Moscow, from where it was taken to Iran, said Christoph Lange from the prosecutor's office in Potsdam near Berlin.

He said Vero appeared to have been buying up nuclear technology in Germany and elsewhere in Europe since 2000 at the orders of Russia, which is constructing Iran's first nuclear power plant in the town of Bushehr.

Lange said prosecutors have so far only traced material worth about five million euros (6.8 million dollars), but that this appeared to be the tip of the iceberg. Up to 150 million euros' worth of material may have left Germany for Iran, he estimates.

[brigadoon]

All terrorism from the ME would stop if Russia stood with us against it. But Russia was, is and will continue to be the enemy of this country. Everything Condoleeza Rice has touched has failed. She was the Russian expert; look at how Russia stands at odds against us. Do you doubt that their advisors are in Syria and Iran today, just as they were in Baghdad prior to the invasion, training and preparing those nations against us? Where does Iran accquire its tank killers, the murderers of our bravest children? Where does it acquire its nuclear fuel? Where did the Hezbollah acquire the rockets that turned the Merkabahs into death traps? As for Condoleeza... her State Department has bungled Iraq for years, and continues to disgrace itself with these so called “benchmarks”; acceding to their inclusion in the progress report allowing the Rats an excuse for treason. The sooner our President turns away from her and the other disciples of Baker/Scowcroft the better he will be.

[Wuli]

Are the German investigators going to follow these exports up the political chain in Germany, to see what if anything the predecessor to the current prime minister of Germany had to do with the exports getting to Russia and Iran???; in as much as he is now working for Putin as part of one of Putin’s great energy conglomerates?????

[ocr1]

ping