My story in the @FTMag today - The Fugitive Prince: how a man with a claim to a royal title and a vast fortune made a deal with a notorious businessman that cost him more than he could have imagined.

RT @TheGoodISIS: Important investigation and skillful graphics by @FinancialTimes on an Iranian visit to Russia as part of an effort to acq….

RT @RichardMNephew: A really important story. (I should have flagged in my original post the humans behind this good work -- @maxseddon an….

RT @vali_nasr: Eye-opening investigation on whether Iran is moving closer to building nuclear weapons, and also how deep Iran-Russia relat….

RT @ian_j_stewart: Important piece in which I say: "While there could be benign explanations for these visits, the totality of the informat….

RT @FT: An FT investigation has found that an Iranian delegation visited Russian scientific institutes that produce components with civil a….

RT @HannaNotte: "The covert trip by Iranian nuclear experts to Russia". Impressive @FT investigation by @maxseddon @MilesMJohnson & others….

RT @NicoleGrajewski: Investigative report by @MilesMJohnson and @maxseddon for the @FT reveals a covert trip by Iranian SPND-linked nuclear….

You can read the full article here:

7 In May this year the US State Department issued fresh sanctions against the SPND, warning that it was working on “dual-use research and development activities applicable to nuclear weapons and nuclear weapons delivery systems”, and attempting to procure technology from abroad.

7) Iran has consistently denied ever pursuing nuclear weapons, citing a religious fatwa from Khamenei banning their use. It maintains that its nuclear programme is entirely peaceful. Russia has always maintained it is strongly against Iranian nuclear proliferation.

6) Our investigation does not claim this evidence shows that Iran was actively building a nuclear weapon. It does show how SPND-linked scientific networks continued to covertly pursue dual-use, nuclear-relevant technologies and international partnerships.

5) Shortly before the visit, the delegation’s lead wrote to a Russian supplier to enquire about buying tritium, strontium-90, and nickel-63 - radioactive isotopes with civilian uses, but which are tightly controlled and monitored under non-proliferation rules.

4) Once in Russia they met with sanctioned Russian institutes that work on dual-use technology with potential relevance to nuclear weapons. The scientist who invited them has been a contractor for an institute under the control of the GRU, Russia’s military intelligence agency.

3) Most of the delegation travelled on Iranian diplomatic service passports, some freshly issued and with sequential numbers. One was the ex-CEO of a US sanctioned nuclear procurement front company. Another was an Iranian military counter intelligence officer.

2) The FT has found that this delegation included individuals with links to SPND, an Iranian military-scientific unit described by the US as “the direct successor organisation to Iran’s pre-2004 nuclear weapons programme”.

NEW INVESTIGATION: The covert trip by Iranian nuclear experts to Russia, with @maxseddon. Last August a delegation of Iranian nuclear scientists flew from Tehran to Moscow. They appeared like civilians working for a small Tehran-based consulting firm. But it was a cover story.

RT @maxseddon: NEW: A delegation of Iranian nuclear scientists visited Russian scientific institutes last year. The research centers work o….

Thank you! 🙏.

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