On May 13, 2013, a Nigerian court sentenced Azim Aghajani, allegedly a member of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), and his Nigerian accomplice Ali Usman Abbas Jega, to five years in prison for their role in an arms smuggling case. Aghajani and Jega were charged with falsifying shipping documents and hiding mortars and rockets among 13 containers of building.  The arms shipment was due for re-export to the Gambia, according to court documents, and may have been destined for a rebel group in southern Senegal.

Nigerian authorities intercepted the Iranian arms as they were unloaded in Tin Can Port, Lagos on July 15, 2010. The weapons, dispatched by Behineh Trading Co. of Tehran in violation of U.N. Security Council resolution 1747, included 240 tons of ammunition, 107mm rockets, and 60mm, 81mm and 120mm mortar shells. The French-based shipping company CMA-CGM, which carried the shipment, said a false cargo declaration was to blame. Israeli defense sources reportedly believe that Nigeria may be a new stop on a smuggling route from Iran to Hamas.

Several entities have been sanctioned for their involvement in this incident as well as their ties to Iran’s Qods Force, a unit of the IRGC. Ali Akbar Tabatabaei, Azim Aghajani, and Behineh Trading Co. were sanctioned by the European Union on December 1, 2011 for their role in "furnishing ammunition from Iran via Nigeria." Esmail Ghani, Ali Abbas Usman Jega, Aghajani, Tabatabaei, and Behineh Trading Co. were added to the Specially Designated Nationals (SDN) list maintained by the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control on March 27, 2012. The United Nations also designated Aghajani, Tabatabaei, and Behineh Trading Co. on April 18, 2012 for violating resolution 1747, which prohibits arms exports from Iran.