KABUL, Afghanistan — Explosive devices similar to those supplied by Iran to violent groups in Iraq have been found for the first time in Afghanistan.

As concern mounts in Kabul over Iranian ambitions in the region, the Daily Telegraph has learned that three Explosively Formed Projectile — or “shaped charge” — devices have been found in Taliban weapons caches in the west of Afghanistan in recent weeks.

NATO yesterday confirmed the discovery of at least one such device and said it was similar to the sort seen in use in Iraq.

EFPs, a form of shaped charge, are used in devastating roadside bombs that have been able to defeat even the best armored Western tanks and personnel carriers in Iraq.

They work by concentrating the explosive force of the device through a machine-turned concave copper plate, which is projected as a molten missile through the side of the targeted vehicle.

Britain has publicly accused Iran of supplying Shiite militants in southern Iraq with such devices where they have caused the deaths of several dozen British soldiers.

Western diplomatic sources say that the devices found in Afghanistan are of inferior quality to those seen in Iraq and therefore not in themselves conclusive proof of Iranian state supply to the Taliban. However, military sources in Kabul said they offered clear evidence of a long-feared “technology transfer” from the Iraq insurgency.

“There was an Explosively Formed Device found near Herat. Certain technologies are a cast-iron indicator of Iranian state involvement and this would be if it was from the right components,” one senior Western diplomat said. “But it is a bit boy scout. The build quality and the components are not to the standard that would prove state support.”

However, Major John Thomas, a NATO spokesman, said, “These devices are sophisticated enough that we are very interested in finding the source of their manufacture so that we could prevent more from being made.”

The information came after American and Iranian diplomats met in Baghdad for the first formal face-to-face talks between the two countries in almost three decades, with America accusing Iran of supplying arms to Iraqi militants.

There remains uncertainty within the diplomatic community over whether recent seizures of weapons along the Iranian border represent the work of the Iranian state, dissident elements within it, or simply a failure to control the movement of black market weapons.

British and American Special Forces have intercepted a number of truckloads of weapons crossing the desolate Iranian border into Nimroz province.

In one they found a working SAM–7 ground-to-air missile, which pose a potent threat to British helicopters.