German firm Siemens pulls out of Iran -- Engineering titan cuts ties with Teheran after Stop the Bomb pressure campaign

By BENJAMIN WEINTHAL, JPOST REPORTER IN KRAKOW
Siemens AG, the German engineering giant, which exploited slave labor during WWII in Auschwitz, announced on Tuesday at its annual stockholder meeting that it is severing its business ties with Iran.The decision to pull the plug on new contracts with Teheran took place a day before the 65th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. Stop the Bomb, a pro-Israel NGO in Austria and Germany, mounted a sophisticated yearlong pressure campaign to force Siemens to shut down its Iran operation."Beginning in the middle of this year [2010] we will not accept new business with Iran," Siemens CEO Peter Löscher said at the shareholder meeting in Munich.Speaking from the Olympic Hall in Munich, the site of the stockholder assembly, Michael Spaney, a spokesman for Stop the Bomb, told The Jerusalem Post, "We welcome the announcement" that Siemens plans to walk away from new Iran deals."We hope that Siemens does not engage in continued business with Iran through third countries," Spaney added.Many German firms are circumventing UN and EU sanctions - as well as domestic export control regulations - by shipping military equipment and so-called "dual-use" technology to countries such as Russia and the Dubai free trade zone. According to an internal memorandum from late November obtained by the Post, the German-Emirati Joint Council for Industry and Commerce advises companies on "how to do business in Iran through Dubai."Dr. Peter Göpfrich, the head of the business group, is coordinating the third-party trade and could not be immediately reached for a comment.
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