2 charged in UK over airbase plot; 1 accused of helping foreign power, believed to be Iran
London residents Nouman Essghir and Mohmed Ahmad Abdulkarim, both 24, accused of plot to attack RAF base used by US forces to strike Iran
UK anti-terrorism police said Tuesday two men have been charged with national security offenses after an incident last month at a British airbase used by the United States, linking the scare to Iran.
The head of National Counter Terrorism Policing, Laurence Taylor, said two British men aged 24 have been charged: one with assisting a foreign intelligence service, believed to be in Iran, and another with entering a prohibited place for a purpose “prejudicial” to the UK.
This is the first time that anyone has been charged over the incident, though police arrested seven suspects in the days afterwards, before releasing them on bail.
Police were called to the Royal Air Force’s Fairford base in southwest England in the early hours of September 27 after a local farmer reported a group of men with several white vans engaged in “suspicious” activity.
Days later the United States abruptly withdrew all its B-1 bombers from the base.
A week ago police said they had rearrested two of the suspects, one of whom has now been charged.
Police charged 24-year-old Nouman Essghir with entering or approaching a “prohibited place” for a purpose “prejudicial” to the interests of the United Kingdom.
Essghir was arrested at the scene in Gloucestershire and then released on bail, before police rearrested him a week ago.
The police chief said the charge against Essghir related to “suspected activity” more than a month earlier, on August 22, without giving any details.
The second man who has been charged, 24-year-old Mohmed Ahmad Abdulkarim, was arrested after being interviewed under caution over the last week, police said.
He has been charged with assisting a foreign intelligence service. “In this case, we believe that country to be Iran,” the police service said.
Both of the charged men live in Westminster, a district in London.
Six other men remain on bail, all living in London and aged between 23 and 25. One of these is a dual British and Iranian national.