A man who worked overseas for the United States government has been charged with leaking classified information prior to Israel’s planned missile attack on Iran last month.
The man, identified as Asif William Rahman, was arrested by the FBI this week in Cambodia and was due to make his first court appearance in Guam on Thursday, during which prosecutors are expected to request his removal from the US territory, according to legal filings in the case.
Rahman was indicted last week in US court in Virginia on two counts of disclosing national defence information under the Espionage Act, and could face a lengthy prison sentence.
According to the indictment, Rahman “willfully retained” a classified document and “transmitted that document to a person not entitled to receive it”.
The New York Times reported that Rahman was employed by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). A CIA spokesperson declined to comment to Al Jazeera.
News of the arrest of Rahman comes a day after a Pentagon leaker, Jack Teixeira, was sentenced in Boston to 15 years in prison for ‘significant’ violations of the Espionage Act.
The leaked documents were prepared by the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), which analyses images and information collected by US spy satellites, the newspaper reported.
The NGA conducts work in support of secret US military operations.
The documents appeared last month on a channel of the Telegram messaging app. The documents noted that Israel was still moving military assets in place to conduct a military strike in response to Iran’s blistering ballistic missile attack on October 1.
Israel carried out a retaliatory attack on multiple sites in Iran in late October.
After the attack, Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei warned Israel and the US of “a crushing response” for actions against Iran and its allies, according to state media.
