ATHENS (Reuters) -Greek police have arrested an Azeri man suspected of espionage on the island of Crete, which is home to a NATO military base, based on information from the country's intelligence service, police said on Monday.
Greek authorities were investigating if the 26-year-old Azeri man was monitoring the base in Souda - a strategic facility for Greece, the U.S. and the NATO military alliance in the eastern Mediterranean - and if the case was linked with the recent arrest of a British man in Cyprus on suspicion of terrorism-related offences, sources said.
The man, who was arrested on Sunday, had been staying since June 18 in a hotel near the naval and air force base in western Crete. More than 5,000 photographs and encryption software were found on a laptop that was confiscated, along with other digital equipment, from the hotel room, the sources said.
The man was charged with espionage and disobidience on Monday, after refusing to give fingerprints, one of the sources added. He is expected to respond to the charges on Wednesday.
(Reporting by Yannis Souliotis; Writing by Renee Maltezou; Editing by Alex Richardson and Toby Chopra)
