Nov. 13 (UPI) — CIA official Asif W. Rahman was arrested by the FBI Tuesday in Cambodia on two counts of violating the Espionage Act in classified documents leaks about Israeli military plans. He will appear Thursday in a Guam court.
According to the New York Times, citing court documents and a source familiar, Rahman faces two counts of willful retention and transmission of national defense information.
He worked for the CIA abroad and had a top-secret clearance that gave him access to classified documents.
The highly classified leaked documents prepared by the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency included satellite imagery detail regarding Israel’s plans to strike Iran.
The leaks late last month came just before Israel’s military hit Iran in retaliation for an Oct. 1 Iranian missile attack on Israel. They were marked Top Secret and appeared to come from the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency.
The documents included details on Israeli Air Force missile launches and drone launches done in preparation for the attack on Iran.
The documents revealed types of aircraft and weapons contemplated using and the movement of munitions and also tracked Israeli military exercises as the attack on Iran was being planned.
Included in the documents was information noting the possible existence of weapons that included “Golden Horizon” air-launched ballistic missile and a weapon known as ROCKS, created by Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, maker of the Iron Dome missile defense system.
