October 11-13
A US judge has sentenced an Iranian citizen to 48 months in prison for smuggling 3,695 electronic components from the United States to Iran.
Arsalan Shemirani, 30, was also fined $187,305.
Shemirani pleaded guilty January 25 in the US District Court for the District of Columbia to conspiracy to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) and to defraud the United States.
According to court documents filed in the case, from January 2010 and through November 2011, Shemirani, with his brother in Iran and a coconspirator in Hong Kong, exported electronic parts from the United States to Iran, via Canada and Hong Kong, without first obtaining a license from the US Treasury Department.
Shemirani, who was residing in Canada during the time, received purchase orders from his brother, who operated an electronics supply business in Tehran.
The items illegally sent to Iran included high performance electronic power equipment such as field programmable microchips, acceleration sensor semiconductors, analog converters, and other testing and power equipment.
The prosecution did not make clear if it thought the equipment was destined for Iran’s military or its nuclear program.