Two Indian firms blacklisted on Friday by the US for allegedly supplying chemicals used to make weapons of mass destruction (WMDs) or long-range missiles to Iran, have refuted the claims and decided to present their defence to South Block next week.

The firms, blacklisted until July 2008 under Washington’s Iran-Syria Non-Proliferation Act this week, are Hyderabad-based Balaji Amines Ltd, a Rs 150-crore firm listed on the BSE, and a privately held Rs 30-crore Mumbai-based firm Prachi Poly Products Ltd.

Both have said the chemicals they exported to Iran have no use in the manufacture of weapons of any kind. Other agencies blacklisted on Friday are Russia’s Sukhoi and Rosoboronexport, and firms in Cuba and North Korea. Two other Indian firms — Sandhya Organics and Sabero Organics — were blacklisted under similar charges by the US in December last year.

Speaking to The Indian Express from Solapur, Maharashtra, Balaji Amines director Ram Reddy said, ‘‘We have followed all laid down procedures. The items we exported to Iran are used in the manufacture of antibiotics, and we sell the same products to big pharma companies in India as well.’’

Reddy indicated that his firm was unofficially instructed by the External Affairs Ministry last year to stop exporting to Iran, after which the firm complied in December even though its insistence on an official written order from the government did not come through.

The firm had contracts with Iran’s Zakaria Tabriz Pharmaceutical and Chemical Company and Antibiotic Sazi Iran for the supply of triethyleamide, diethylyamide and diethyleacetamide, raw materials used to make antibiotics like ampicillin, amoxyciline and cephalaxin.

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