Khalife had 'a selfish desire to show off'published at 13:51 Greenwich Mean Time
Before Justice Cheema-Grubb sentenced Khalife to 14 years and three months in prison, she gave her sentencing remarks:
- Khalife - now 23 - joined the Army just before he was 17, and later initiated contact with Iranian agents
- Khalife, whose mother is British-Iranian, used his Iranian heritage to "seem genuine to his handlers"
- He shared secret information, including the names of special forces, which exposed "military personnel to serious harm"
- Because content was deleted, the court can't be sure exactly what was sent, but the judge said "I am sure you sent some of what you recorded to your handlers"
- On two occasions, Khalife received payment from Iranian handlers. On one occasion, he accepted £1,000 in cash in a London cemetery
- Khalife did not start out deliberately to harm the UK, the judge said: "You embarked on the course of conduct... because of a selfish desire to show off, to achieve by unregulated means what you were told will be difficult for you to achieve by conventional promotion"
- "When you joined the Army as a young man, you had the makings of an exemplary soldier," the judge concluded. "However, through the repeated violation of your oath of service, you showed yourself to be, instead, a dangerous fool"