When companies wind up with products in Iran, they usually claim that they were hoodwinked by their overseas sales reps or agents. In a case involving the German security firm Dräger Safety, the situation appears reversed. According to this article in Deutsche Welle, Dräger’s agent is claiming that he was hoodwinked by the company.

Dräger had been contracted by Italian-based Irasco to build and deliver a security system for an Iranian pipeline. The security system used GE Security’s VisioWave monitoring software. Initially Dräger, apparently concerned the the U.S embargo on exports to Iran, told Irasco that it would have to obtain and install the software on its own and install the software itself in Iran. Irasco made some unsuccessful efforts to obtain the software and then, allegedly, demanded a full test of the system at Dräger’s facility in Lübeck, Germany.

Dräger then tasked Sasan Azodi, its intermediary with Irasco, to obtain the software and ship it to Lübeck. Oddly enough, what happens in Lübeck, doesn’t stay in Lübeck and, for reasons that Dräger can’t fully explain, the software miraculously wound up in Irasco’s hands in Iran. Sometime thereafter, Dräger filed a voluntary disclosure with U.S. government authorities revealing the problem.

Now let the finger-pointing begin. Azodi has this to say:

Azodi acknowledges that he arranged for the delivery of the software, via the US, to Luebeck, but claims he only sent it for test purposes. Upon learning that the software had been delivered to Iran, Azodi said, “that’s when I realized I had probably been conned.”

Dräger, for its part, apparently is trying to blame everything on Azodi and has refused to pay Azodi for the software, which costs approximately $125,000. Azodi has filed lawsuits, in both the United States and Europe, seeking the money that he claims is owed for the software and seeking recovery of the damages caused to his business by the allegation that he violated the Iranian embargo.

Of course, one has to wonder why Azodi didn’t see red flags all over the field when Dräger asked Azodi to purchase and export the expensive GE software to Germany. Why couldn’t Dräger do that itself? Why would it ask its Iranian intermediary to ship the software from the U.S. to Germany?

It should be interesting to see how this plays out. Pass the popcorn, as they say.