NEW YORK (AP) -- U.S. authorities charged 18 people in an alleged scheme to smuggle grenade launchers, shoulder-fired missiles and other Russian military weapons into the United States.
The arrests resulted from a yearlong investigation in which an FBI informant posed as an arms buyer who claimed to have ties to al-Qaida.
The case, which took investigators to South Africa, Armenia and the Georgian Republic, also included wiretaps on seven phones and interceptions of more than 15,000 calls, according to prosecutors, the FBI and police.
The informant, an explosives expert, contacted the FBI after he was approached by a man who said he had access to weapons from the former Soviet Union and believed the informant could find a willing buyer, federal prosecutors said.
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