Taxi driver fighting extradition over ‘spying at Cyprus RAF base’https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/0 ... -raf-base/
An alleged Iranian spy has appeared in a Cyprus court to fight extradition to the UK after he was accused of espionage at an RAF base.
Taxi driver Rashad Sultanov, 44, a dual UK and Azerbaijani national living in Islington, north London, is suspected of spying for Iran by monitoring fighter jet movements at the island’s RAF Akrotiri base in Cyprus.
The Metropolitan Police has alleged that Mr Sultanov conducted hostile surveillance on Akrotiri – which is under British sovereignty – and then shared information with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC).
First arrested by Cypriot police in June 2025, criminal charges were suspended earlier this month after British prosecutors intervened to try to extradite him so he could face espionage charges in the UK.
It is the first investigation of its kind using the National Security Act 2023 in relation to alleged offences overseas.
Mr Sultanov appeared at Limassol District Court on Thursday wearing a pro-Palestine T-shirt for the beginning of the extradition proceedings against him, which he is challenging.
He is currently remanded in custody at the Central Jail of Nicosia. The Telegraph understands that the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) is seeking to bring him to HMP Belmarsh in London.
He is reportedly believed to have a direct connection to the IRGC and was arrested last June on suspicion of carrying out surveillance on Akrotiri, a key staging post for the UK’s military operations across the Middle East.
The suspected spy was said at the time to have been taking photographs at the base with long-lens cameras as well as with phones, and writing copious notes in the three months before his arrest, according to a report from the local Philenews website last year.
More recently, based on the claims underpinning the UK’s extradition request, he allegedly sent material to his “handler”, who is believed to be Elsad Elsin Hajiyev, an Azerbaijani-Iranian national wanted under an international arrest warrant.
On Thursday, Mr Sultanov spoke only in Azerbaijani [Azeri] to the court-appointed translator and repeatedly said that he was struggling to understand what was happening.
He wore a black T-shirt bearing the white outline of historic Palestinian territories on its front and, on the back, displaying a well-known photograph of a wheelchair-using Palestinian activist launching a missile with a slingshot during the 2018 Gaza border demonstrations.
The Telegraph has been able to picture Mr Sultanov for the first time at an art exhibition and group dinner hosted by the Azeri Network in Leicester, a community diaspora group for Azerbaijani Turks in the city.
Before moving to London, Mr Sultanov worked as a taxi driver in Leicester and supplemented his income by importing pomegranate juice. He had indefinite leave to remain in the UK, according to a well-placed source.
A close friend of Mr Sultanov, who was unaware of the allegations when contacted by this newspaper, said Mr Sultanov was occasionally vocal about Palestinian rights and the conflict in Israel. Former acquaintances of Mr Sultanov said they were unaware of his alleged connections to the IRGC.
“He worked as a taxi driver in Leicester, he later moved down to London with his wife and was trying to obtain his licence there,” said one friend who described his living circumstances as modest.
Mr Sultanov is listed as the company director of Yasamal Ltd, a pomegranate juice importation company founded in November 2018 which lists its address on a residential street in Leicester. A source that knew him at that time said he was living at the address with his partner.
Financial accounts seen by The Telegraph show Mr Sultanov owed creditors more than £40,000 and had net assets of £1,500.
Efstathios Efstathiou, Mr Sultanov’s lawyer, is seeking to prevent the extradition and successfully argued in court on Thursday that the proceedings should be adjourned until Mr Sultanov is provided with a UK lawyer funded by British legal aid.
He said his client had a right to this under the EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement.
Mr Sultanov has denied the allegations.
The hearing will resume next week. The judge has ordered the prosecution, acting on behalf of British authorities, to arrange for Mr Sultanov to have a UK lawyer by that time.
Akrotiri is home to the RAF’s Eurofighter Typhoons as well as reconnaissance, transport and refuelling aircraft and is the UK’s largest military installation outside Britain. In the months leading up to Mr Sultanov’s arrest last year, the base was used as a key hub for providing support to Israel and for launching air strikes against Iran-backed Houthi targets in Yemen.
The CPS has authorised charges under section 3 and 4 of the National Security Act, which relate respectively to assisting a foreign intelligence service and to entering a designated prohibited place, such as Akrotiri.
Commander Helen Flanagan, head of Counter Terrorism Policing London, said: “This case shows we are able to use the National Security Act overseas when British military bases are allegedly targeted by hostile state activity.
“A huge amount of partnership work has been carried out between British and Cypriot law enforcement agencies.
“We continue to work with colleagues from the CPS, National Crime Agency and Cypriot authorities as extradition proceedings progress.”
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