WASHINGTON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 27th March, 2021) A US citizen pleaded guilty to transmitting classified information to a foreign national intended for the Lebanese Hezbollah movement and now faces a sentence of life in jail, the US Justice Department said.
According to the statement, the prosecution believes that Mariam Taha Thompson, a 63-year-old former contract linguist at overseas US military facilities, shared with her co-conspirator the identities of at least ten clandestine human assets, at least 20 US targets, data on multiple tactics, techniques and procedures.
"Thompson jeopardized the lives of members of the US military as well as other individuals supporting the United States in a combat zone when she passed classified information to a person she knew was connected to Lebanese Hizbollah, a foreign terrorist organization which intended to use the information to hurt this country," Assistant Attorney General John Demers said on Friday.
During Friday's plea hearing, Thompson admitted that she communicated with her unindicted co-conspirator over a messaging application and developed a romantic interest in him.
The co-conspirator asked Thompson, who was assigned to a US special operations task force facility in Iraq, to provide "them" with information on human assets who helped the Americans to target and kill top Iranian commander Qasem Suleimani in early 2020. The defendant admitted that she understood "them" to be Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed Lebanese military and political movement, according to the statement.
Thompson was arrested by the FBI on February 27, 2020. She faces a maximum sentence of up to life in jail, according to the Justice Department.
