Spying for Qatar: Case adjourned to April 24

Manama : Hearing into the Qatar spy scandal, surrounding Ali Salman Ali Ahmed, Hassan Ali Jumaa Sultan and Ali Mehdi Ali Al Aswad, has been adjourned to April 24, following a preliminary hearing in the High Criminal Court, yesterday.

The first defendant attended the trial accompanied by his lawyers. The second and third defendants did not attend.

Advocate General Osama Al Oufi said the suspects were referred by the Public Prosecution to trial on charges of “intelligence with a foreign country to carry out hostile acts against Bahrain, undermine its political and economic status as well as its national interest to overthrow the political system.”

They were also charged with “passing defence secrets to a foreign country, accepting money from a foreign country in consideration for providing it with military secrets and information about the internal situation of the country, spreading tendentious rumours and fallacies abroad to weaken the financial confidence in the Kingdom and undermine its prestige.”