A former British soldier accused of escaping from Wandsworth prison last year made contact with Iranian security forces before telling MI6 he wanted to work as a double agent, a trial has heard.
Daniel Khalife, 23, is on trial on charges of collecting sensitive military information for Iran.
Woolwich Crown Court heard Mr Kalef obtained details about members of the armed forces serving on active duty from the personnel system.
He denies all charges.
Prosecutors told the court Iran posed a real threat to Britain’s security.
The jury heard that Mr Kalef, who was raised in Kingston, south-west London by his Iranian-born mother, enlisted in the army in September 2018, two weeks before his 17th birthday.
After completing a 23-week course at Army Basic College in Harrogate, North Yorkshire, he joined the Royal Corps of Signals, which provides communications, IT and network support.
The court heard Mr Khalife underwent and passed a security clearance before commencing professional training in 2019 and completed the one-year course in early 2020.
Thereafter, he was assigned to Stafford’s 16th Signal Regiment, which provides advanced digital communications and satellite services to the military.
“In this case we are not talking about strange personal radios,” prosecutor Mark Heywood KC said.
“When the security of these systems and communications is at risk, the Army’s own warfighting capabilities and effectiveness are also at risk.”
Mr Khalife’s trial heard that in April 2019 he created a contact to the Iranian phone number +98.
The jury heard that Mr Kalef told police in an interview in 2022 that he had been in contact with Hamed Ghashghavi, who had links to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
He told police he was then transferred to an English-speaking administrator.
Mr Heywood KC said: “He clearly did this with the intention of using himself as an asset to Iran’s external security apparatus.”
The soldier later claimed it was all part of a double bluff and that he intended to sell himself to British security services, the court heard.
The jury heard that someone used the “Contact Us” page of the security service’s website to send a message to MI6 under a false name, claiming he wanted to work as a “double agent”.
The court heard the message claimed he was asked to provide information to the Iranian government and sent them a false document, for which the Iranian government was paid $2,000 (£1,500), which was packed in Mill Hill Park, north London. in a shit bag.
The jury was shown a selfie of Mr Khalife taken in a park and a photo of an envelope inside a dog poop bag.
Mr Heywood KC said: “Over more than two years Mr Kaleff collected and produced a large number of records of this information, both digitally and sometimes in paper form.
“He has been a serving soldier in the British Army employed to maintain and protect national security.”
He added: “Mr Kaliff had no real intention other than to put his head down, learn his craft and become what he thought was an Army signalman or even a specialist.
“Even in the early stages of his studies, when he was only 17, he was already thinking about espionage.”
Jurors were told that after police tracked him down and he was released on bail, Kalef absconded from the barracks, leaving cans and wires on his desk that looked like explosive devices.
Mr Kalef is alleged to have escaped from HMP Wandsworth prison in south London on September 6, 2023, while on remand on terror and espionage charges, by strapping himself to the bottom of a food delivery truck.
He was arrested three days later on a canal towpath in west London.
The trial, expected to last about six weeks, continues.
