US Citizen Sentenced to Prison for Illegal Arms Transfers

A naturalized U.S. citizen was sentenced to 30 years in prison after pleading guilty to several export violations, including illegally transferring missile systems and unlicensed arms brokering, the Justice Department said in an Aug. 20 press release. Rami Najm Asad-Ghanem, who was living in Egypt at the time of the offenses, transferred “a wide array of surface-to-air missile systems” around the world, the Justice Department said, including to clients in Libya, the United Arab Emirates, Iraq and Hezbollah.

In 2015, Ghanem conspired to use Russian-made missile systems “by brokering the services of mercenary missile operators to a militant faction in Libya,” the press release said. Ghanem negotiated the salaries for the “mercenary missile operators,” organized their travel and offered them a $50,000 bonus “if they were successful in their mission of shooting down” Libyan government airplanes.

U.S. authorities began investigating Ghanem in 2014 after a Los Angeles-based company told Homeland Security Investigations that Ghanem had tried to buy their military equipment, the press release said. During an undercover operation, HSI agents discovered Ghanem was also trying to illegally buy sniper rifle and “night-vision optics” and said he was looking into buying helicopters and fighter jets for clients in Iran.

Ghanem was arrested during the undercover operation after making two down payments on $220,000 worth of defense-related goods, including sniper rifles, pistols, silencers and laser sights, the Justice Department said. U.S. authorities also found “evidence of other large-scale arms brokering activities, including millions of rounds of ammunition, anti-tank missiles, and the scheme to transfer and use anti-aircraft missiles.” Ghanem planned to sell $250 million worth of weapons to a militant group in Libya and rocket-propelled grenade launchers to Egypt, and tried to traffic “counterfeit currency, looted antiquities and black-market diamonds,” the Justice Department said.