Germany selling arms to Arabs to overcome fiscal woes: Iran MP

“Europe is suffering from a financial crisis, and Germany appears to have felt the pinch,” Member of Iran Majlis (parliament) Committee on the National Security and Foreign Policy Qasem Souri said on Friday.

He noted that Germany has therefore lost much of its prestige as one of Europe’s financial powerhouses.

Souri added that the European countries along with the United States need to create conditions conducive to arms sales in order to rescue themselves from the current financial crisis.

The Iranian legislator stated that only those countries would be willing to buy such munitions that can do nothing but to extract and sell crude oil.

Souri also censured the latest anti-Iran remarks by Germany’s Defense Minister Thomas de Maiziere, noting that the West is misguiding Arab countries of the Middle East by introducing Iran as a threat.

The lawmaker criticized the regional Arab rulers for their gross negligence and lack of understanding of the regional and international developments, stressing that the Arab monarchs cannot realize the difference between threats from Israeli nuclear warheads and Iran which is trying hard to establish peace and stability in the Middle East.

The Iranian MP further highlighted that anti-Iran threats are doomed to failure, and that reactionary Arab states continuously change and modernize their armaments in the face of such imaginary threats.

Souri concluded that Western countries, including Germany, France and the US, introduce Iran as a threat in order to prepare the ground for the sale of their weapons to Arab states, and use their petrodollars to reinvigorate their bankrupt economies.

According to a report published by the Munich-based Suddeutsche Zeitung newspaper on February 22, Germany’s weapons exports to the Arab states in the Persian Gulf reached 1.42 billion euros (USD1.88 billion) in 2012.

The report added that Saudi Arabia was the biggest buyer among the Persian Gulf states including Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates.

The figures indicate that Germany’s arms exports to the Persian Gulf littoral states have increased more than nine times.