US charges three over alleged Fairford terror plot

The US Department of Justice has charged three men over an alleged terrorist plot targeting RAF Fairford, a British military airbase, mbl.is reports. The department described the men as Iranian agents.

The defendants are Mohammad Baqer Saad Dawood al-Saadi, Mohsen Mohajeri and Mohammad Ali al-Hassani. US prosecutors allege they helped organise and direct the incident at the base in September, which the US military has used in operations against Iran.

According to the indictment, al-Hassani, 35, an Iraqi citizen, directed unnamed people to drive vans to the base. Some of the vehicles contained fuel barrels. Prosecutors also allege he had paid the group to buy metal objects that could be used as shrapnel and to disguise the vans as fuel trucks.

Al-Saadi, 32, who holds Iranian and Iraqi citizenship, is already in prison in New York on a charge of planning to bomb a synagogue. He is also accused of planning 18 further attacks in Europe. Prosecutors allege he sent encrypted messages to al-Hassani and Mohajeri, a 48-year-old Iranian citizen, to coordinate activity ahead of the alleged plot.

The investigation began after a local farmer reported seeing a group of men and several white vans behaving suspiciously near Fairford, in south-west England. A few days after the incident, the US military withdrew all its B-1 bombers from the base. The three men face eight counts, including allegations involving other plots in support of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and the Iran-aligned group Kataeb Hezbollah.