US soldier held in England on suspicion of helping Russian intelligence
Police detained the 41-year-old near Gloucester; the FBI says the espionage allegations are of the utmost concern to the United States and its allies.
A United States Army soldier has been arrested in England on suspicion of assisting Russian intelligence, a case British counterterrorism police are handling and which the FBI has described as a matter of serious concern for Washington and its allies.
The man, 41, was detained near Gloucester in western England and remained in custody on Tuesday, according to France 24. CBC News reported that counterterrorism police made the arrest. The Associated Press described the soldier as assigned to a NATO unit; NATO is the transatlantic military alliance to which both Britain and the United States belong.
FBI Director Kash Patel said the case involved "allegations of espionage, which is of the utmost concern to the United States and our allies", the South China Morning Post reported. The paper also named Brigadier General Sean Stinchon, the commanding general of US Army Counterintelligence Command, in its account of the arrest.
France 24 reported that police said the arrest was not related to other counterterrorism investigations.
The South China Morning Post reported that the detention came after the United States removed aircraft from British military bases over what the paper described as a separate apparent threat from Iran. No report said the two matters were connected.
Reports did not name the soldier, give his home base or say where in Britain he was being held. None of the accounts carried a statement from Russian officials, and no charges had been announced in the reports.
British police forces routinely lead counterterrorism arrests on UK soil, and the involvement of US Army Counterintelligence Command indicates the case is being treated on both sides of the Atlantic as a military intelligence matter.
The arrest puts a Russian intelligence allegation at the centre of the US-UK defence relationship at a moment when American aircraft have been moved off British bases. Officials in London and Washington had not, in the accounts published on Tuesday, set out what the soldier is alleged to have done or to whom.
How the reports differ
The Associated Press described the soldier as assigned to a NATO unit, a detail the other reports did not carry. France 24 alone gave the place of detention, near Gloucester in western England, and reported police saying the arrest was not linked to other counterterrorism investigations. CBC News attributed the arrest directly to counterterrorism police, while the South China Morning Post was the only outlet to quote FBI Director Kash Patel and to report that US aircraft had been removed from British military bases over an apparent threat from Iran. The South China Morning Post also named Brigadier General Sean Stinchon of US Army Counterintelligence Command, who did not appear in the other accounts.
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