2 men charged with U.K. national security offenses in incident at U.S.-run base in England

LONDON (AP) — Two men were charged Tuesday with national security offenses over a suspected plot against RAF Fairford, a U.S.-run military air base in England, U.K. police and prosecutors said. British nationals Mohmed Ahmad Abdulkarim and Nouman Essghir, both aged 24 and from London, were charged under the National Security Act, the Crown Prosecution Service said. They were due to appear in a London court on Tuesday. Abdulkarim is charged with assisting Iran’s intelligence service, and Essghir is charged with entering a prohibited place for a purpose prejudicial to the U.K. RAF Fairford, in western England, has been used by American bombers to strike Iran during the U.S. war with the country.

Essghir was arrested outside the base on Sept. 27, when police officers and army bomb-disposal experts swarmed the rural area and searched for explosives. Scores of residents were evacuated from their homes. Police later said they had found an accelerant — gasoline — in vans at the scene but no explosives. Essghir was initially released on bail before being re-arrested last week. Abdulkarim was arrested in the past week. Six other men have been arrested and released on bail as investigations continue.

British authorities have linked Tehran to the incident, which led the U.S. to pull its bombers from RAF Fairford. British Prime Minister Andy Burnham said that the suspected plot was “almost certainly” directed by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard. Iran has denied involvement, although it has said that it considers any base used to attack its territory a legitimate target. Earlier this month, the head of Britain’s MI5 spy agency warned that both Iran and Russia were expanding their attacks against the U.K., and that the RAF Fairford incident was not unique.

Ken McCallum, who leads the U.K.’s domestic security service, said Tehran is seeking to intensify its attacks in Britain beyond the traditional targets of Iranians opposed to the country’s Islamic authorities. He said more than 50 people have been arrested over Iran-linked plots in the past year. Assistant Commissioner Laurence Taylor, the head of National Counter Terrorism Policing in the U.K., said, “We have seen a range of incidents in recent months that we believe have been directed by the Iranian state … [and] we are working together to intervene, identify and respond to that threat".