Omid Asadbeigi, owner of the giant Haft Tapeh agro-industrial sugar complex in Shush, is currently on trial in Tehran along with twenty other defendants charged with currency smuggling, illegal transactions and bribery totaling some USD 1.4 billion, a huge sum of money in cash-strapped Iran. The dollars for Haft Tapeh were ostensibly to finance investment in new machinery for the country's leading sugar producer, but Haft Tapeh workers have not been paid their wages since mid-March.