The Degussa Vacuum furnaces were supplied to Iraq in the 1980’s by a German firm (Degussa AG based in Frankfurt Germany)
At the time Saddam handed his last-minute "compliance" to the UN in late 2002, there were some articles (NYT was one place I believe) about how he seemed to be using the disclosures to blackmail certain German companies, or something to that effect. I have the articles somewhere but will need to dig them up.
Iraq's UN report says 86 German firms did business there: press Monday,
Iraq's arms report to the United Nations shows that more than 80 German companies have done business with Baghdad since the 1970s and that some have contravened a UN embargo, according to a German newspaper.
In its Tuesday edition, the daily Tageszeitung said that the companies included public and private research laboratories and firms which supplied whole systems or components for weapons of mass destruction.
Citing what it claimed were parts of the report, the newspaper said some of the 86 companies that had been doing business in Iraq since around 1975 had continued to do so at least up until 2001.