The US has accused an Iranian national of brokering an arms deal with Sudan’s defense ministry, including drones and ammunition.
Published on 20 April 2026
The US Justice Department says an Iranian national has been arrested at Los Angeles International Airport on charges of smuggling weapons to Sudan on behalf of Tehran.
Shamim Mafi, 44, was arrested and charged with brokering the sale of drones, bombs, bomb fuses and millions of rounds of ammunition manufactured by Iran and sold to Sudan, the department said in a post on Twitter on Monday.
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US Attorney Bill Essaly wrote in an earlier X post that Mafi lived in the Los Angeles suburb of Woodland Hills and was “an Iranian citizen who became a lawful permanent resident of the United States in 2016”.
Mafi was arrested Saturday and faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in federal prison if convicted.
Essaily’s post was accompanied by photos of a woman believed to be pardoned surrounded by federal agents at an airport, a large drone on the road, an ID image of a woman and bundles of cash.
The United Nations recently warned that Sudan was at risk of slipping into “full-scale famine and collapse” as the war between its army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) entered its fourth year.
A criminal complaint dated March 12 alleged that Mafi and an unnamed conspirator operated a company called Atlas International Business in Oman, through which arms and ammunition were smuggled. The company received a payout of more than $7m in 2025.
According to court documents, Mafi and the conspirators separately brokered the sale of 55,000 bomb fuses to the Sudanese Defense Ministry.
“In connection with the transaction, Mafi submitted a letter of intent to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (‘IRGC’) to purchase bomb fuses for Sudan,” the complaint states.
Mafi is scheduled to appear in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles on Monday. If found guilty, he could face up to 20 years in prison.
Dennis Brown, the UN chief in Sudan, told AFP news agency on Thursday that Sudan is facing the world’s largest humanitarian crisis and weapons from outside sources are also responsible for this.
The United Nations has repeatedly called on foreign powers to stop fueling the war but has not blamed specific states.
On the one hand, the Sudanese army is supported by Egypt and Saudi Arabia and has deployed Turkish and Iranian-made drones.
However, most of the blame has been placed on the UAE, which denies evidence that it has supplied weapons to the RSF, which has been accused of genocide.
