According to Reuters, German federal prosecutors said on the 22nd that a german citizen had been prosecuted on suspicion of helping Russian intelligence agencies obtain chemicals used to produce weapons of mass destruction.
German prosecutors said the suspect was named Alexander S. (Alexander S.), who runs a trading company in Saxony, in eastern Germany. Since 2017, the company has exported chemicals worth 1 million euros to a front company run by Russian intelligence officers. Germany's attorney general said in a statement that the suspects had always been aware that they were dealing with dual-use chemicals. According to the requirements of German federal law, the export of this chemical requires a special license. The suspect was arrested in May last year. "The Russian company is part of a network operated by Russian secret services that attempts to hide the military use of these goods by disguising themselves as civilian entities," the statement added. ”
In addition, the suspect is charged with exporting electronic equipment worth 21,000 euros to a Russian agency responsible for developing and manufacturing nuclear weapons between September 2019 and November 2020. The attorney general did not name the agency, which has been under EU sanctions since the 2014 Ukraine crisis. Prosecutors did not say when the Dresden Superior District Court would begin trials of the suspects.
Reuters said the Russian Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to reporters' requests for comment. Russia has previously refuted allegations that it possesses chemical weapons, saying they are baseless and saying it has long since destroyed such weapons under the Chemical Weapons Convention.
(Editor: LH)