The weekly said the man, identified as Rainer V. had been placed under criminal investigation by prosecutors in Munich for 23 alleged cases of infringement of the law on trade in weapons of war.

Based in Pullach, near Munich, he is accused of buying vacuum pumps, special ventilators and spare parts for mass spectrometers from the Pfeiffer Vacuum company of Hesse.

He is alleged to have shipped the material by air from Munich or by ship from Hamburg or Bremen to contacts in the Pakistani capital Islamabad or neighbouring Rawalpindi.

From there the equipment is thought to have been delivered to the Kashmir laboratories of Abdul Qadeer Khan, known as the father of Pakistan's nuclear bomb, Focus said.

In February last year Khan admitted illicitly exporting nuclear technology to Iran, Libya and North Korea.

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