BERLIN — A man caught last month trying to enter Germany with a check worth about $70 million used to head Iran’s central bank, according to the newspaper Bild am Sonntag.
Customs officials at the airport in Duesseldorf found the check in Tahmasb Mazaheri’s luggage upon his Jan. 21 arrival from Turkey, the paper reported.
Officials said Friday that the check — for 300 million Venezuelan bolivares and issued by the Bank of Venezuela — was found on an unnamed 59-year-old man.
Bild am Sonntag wrote in yesterday’s edition that German police and customs officials had launched an investigation into possible money laundering.
Mazaheri was the governor of the Central Bank of Iran until 2008.
Neither customs nor Iran’s embassy could be reached for comment last night.