MANAMA: Bahrain has put two Iranians and a Bahraini on trial on charges of spying for Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, the state news agency said Tuesday.
“They are accused of contacts with the Iranian Revolutionary Guards to give them military and economic information from 2002 to April 2010 … with the intention of damaging the national interest,” the Bahrain News Agency said.

It said the men requested money from Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards force in return for the information.
“The High Court deferred the Hearing of Bahraini citizen’s involvement with Iranian Revolutionary Guards to the [April 20], presided over by judge Sheikh Mohammad bin Ali al-Khalifa,” BNA said.

The report did not say when the trial began or provide other details.
Gulf Arab countries are concerned over what they see as the ambition of Iran, a Shiite power, to extend its influence in Arab countries mostly under Sunni rule.

Bahrain’s Gulf Arab allies accused Iran of interfering in their affairs after Tehran objected to the dispatch of Saudi troops to help Bahrain put down protests last month.
Bahrain, a Sunni Muslim monarchy, received help from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates to help break up the pro-democracy protest movement.

The island state, which hosts the U.S. Fifth Fleet, accuses Iran of fomenting the protests, which were led by majority Shiite Muslims.
Kuwait said this week it had expelled three Iranian diplomats for involvement in a spy ring and in a tit-for-tat move Tehran has given three Kuwaiti diplomats 10 days to leave Iran.

Last month, a Kuwaiti court sentenced two Iranians and a Kuwaiti national to death for being part of the alleged spy ring.
Iran was quick to reject the accusations, with President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad saying Tehran did not need to spy on its “friends” in the region.