Former US Air Force agent charged with spying for Iran

The US has charged a former Air Force intelligence specialist with giving classified information to Iran that helped Tehran target US counter-intelligence agents.

The Department of Justice on Wednesday unsealed an indictment against Monica Witt, 39, who allegedly defected to Iran in 2013 and is believed by US officials to be living in the country. She served as an Air Force intelligence specialist until 2008 and thereafter worked for a cleared defence contractor, US officials said.

Ms Witt, who was born and raised in Texas, is accused of revealing the existence of a classified US intelligence program to the Iranian government, as well as the real identity of a US intelligence officer.

Jay Tabb, the FBI’s executive assistant director for national security, said Ms Witt’s motivation was “primarily ideological”.

“She decided to turn against the United States,” said Mr Tabb

It is a sad day for America when one of its citizens betrays our country

Ms Witt, who could not be reached for comment, was charged alongside four Iranian nationals, who the US claimed used the information she provided to attempt to hack the computers of eight current or former US agents.

She is the latest American intelligence officer accused of betraying the US to a foreign country. Last year, Kevin Mallory, a former CIA officer, was found guilty of spying for China. In that case, Mr Mallory was deep in debt when he was recruited by Chinese agents.

John Demers, assistant attorney-general for the DoJ’s national security division, said Ms Witt’s alleged acts violated “the law, her solemn oath to protect and defend our country, and the bounds of human decency”.

“It is a sad day for America when one of its citizens betrays our country,” he said.

Ms Witt joined the Air Force in 1997, according to US officials. She served as a linguist for five years, using her skills as a Farsi speaker, and was deployed to the Middle East as part of classified missions to collect signals intelligence.

She then worked as a special agent in the Air Force’s office of special investigations until 2008, before leaving to join a defence contractor, where she continued to work with the Air Force until 2010. In the indictment, the US said she had access to top-secret information throughout her time in government.

The justice department said Ms Witt travelled to Iran in 2012 and 2013 to attend conferences organised by the New Horizon Organization, an Iranian entity the US Treasury sanctioned on Wednesday in a parallel action.

“New Horizon hosts international conferences that have provided Iranian intelligence officers a platform to recruit and collect intelligence information from attendees, while propagating anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial,” said Steven Mnuchin, the US Treasury secretary.

On her trips to Iran, Ms Witt appeared in videos broadcast on Iranian television in which she criticised the US government and converted to Islam, according to the indictment. She also allegedly met with members of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps in an apparent effort to defect.

The indictment quoted a message Ms Witt allegedly sent in 2012 to an unnamed dual US-Iranian citizen*, whom the US claimed helped recruit her: “I am endeavouring to put the training I received to good use instead of evil”.

In May 2012, after her first visit, FBI agents warned Ms Witt that Iran would attempt to recruit her. She told them that if she returned to Iran, she would not disclose information about her work with the Air Force, according to the indictment

Ms Witt appeared to have travelled widely around the Middle East and central Asia at the time. In 2014, the FBI issued a “missing person” notice for Ms Witt, which said she may have travelled to the United Arab Emirates or Iran and was last believed to be working as an English teacher in Afghanistan or Tajikistan in July 2013.

“The last known contact with her is believed to have been in June 2013. She had been working overseas for more than a year. Witt’s friends recently reported her missing after not receiving any response from her in several months,” the notice said.

The notice was removed from the FBI’s website shortly after the charges were announced on Wednesday. The FBI had no immediate comment.

In another message cited in the indictment, Ms Witt told the unnamed dual US-Iranian citizen in June 2013: “If all else fails, I just may go public with a program and do like Snowden :)” — a reference to Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency analyst who revealed the existence of US mass surveillance programs in 2013. He currently resides in Russia.

Later that month, she told the dual citizen she had visited the Iranian embassy in Kabul, Afghanistan, and “told all,” according to the indictment. In July, she allegedly wrote to the Iranian national: “I just hope I have better luck with Russia at this point. I am starting to get frustrated at the level of Iranian suspicion.”

“I think I can slip into Russia quietly if they help me and then I can contact wikileaks from there without disclosing my location,” she said in a follow-up message quoted in the indictment. In another message, she said she was seeking “asylum”.

According to the charges, Ms Witt eventually defected to Iran in August 2013. She provided the Iranian government with the code name and mission of a US intelligence operation centred on an unnamed “specific target” and created target packages on US agents for Iran, the justice department said.

*This article has been amended to clarify the nationality of the person alleged to have helped recruit Ms Witt