KUWAIT CITY, Nov 13: The Iranian authorities have arrested two Kuwaitis, Attorney Adel Al-Yahya and Raed Waleed Majid, in Abadan Province in the southwestern part of Iran, on suspicion of spying.
According to the relatives of the arrested persons, the suspects work as a news presenter and a photographer respectively at Al-Adalah Satellite Channel. They went to Iran five days ago to produce a documentary program on the life of Kuwaiti men married to Iranians, similar to the other shows presented earlier by Al-Yahya on the channel.

The relatives said they have lost contact with the suspects since Friday — the day they were supposed to return to Kuwait. They added they did not know their whereabouts until the news of their arrest broke out. They affirmed the suspects have never been involved in politics, while their programs focus on humanity alone. They urged the concerned Kuwaiti authorities to quickly intervene in the case and consider it a matter of urgency to ensure their release on time before new accusations are hurled against them.
Meanwhile, Kuwaiti Ambassador to Iran Majdi Al-Thufairi, in a telephone conversation, disclosed that he was out of Tehran during the arrest, but he was closely following up the case.

Agencies add:
Two Kuwaitis have been arrested in Abadan, southwest Iran, on suspicion of spying and illegal entry, AFP earlier reported quoting a television channel.
“Two Kuwaitis have been arrested in possession of spying materials,” said a local official in the town, Bahram Ilkhaszadeh, quoted by Iran’s Arabic-language satellite channel Al-Alam.
An MP for Abadan, Abdollah Kaabi, also quoted by Al-Alam, said the pair were “arrested two days ago and they entered Iran illegally,” without giving other details.
Ties between the two Gulf neighbours were strained after a Kuwaiti court in March sentenced three people to death and two others to life in prison after convicting them of being members of an Iranian spy ring.
The case led to a tit-for-tat expulsion of diplomats but ambassadors and diplomats returned to the two capitals following a visit to Kuwait City by Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi on May 11.
Kuwait and the other Sunni-ruled Arab monarchies of the Gulf have repeatedly accused mainly Shiite Iran of meddling in their internal affairs and of inciting Shiite-led protests which rocked Bahrain earlier this year.
Manama crushed the pro-democracy protests in mid-March with the help of troops from other Arab states in the region, prompting condemnation by Iran.

Bahrain
The Bahraini judiciary on Sunday linked a busted “terrorist” cell to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, a day after announcing the arrest of five Bahrainis planning attacks in the Arab kingdom.
The five men are accused of belonging to a “terrorist group” with ties to the intelligence services of a foreign state, a judiciary spokesman said, quoted by state news agency BNA.
He said the five were to be “sent to Iran to receive military training,” notably with the elite Revolutionary Guards.

On Saturday, the interior ministry said a cell had been broken up that was planning to attack the ministry, the Saudi embassy in Riyadh and the causeway which links the archipelago state to Saudi Arabia.
Citing alleged confessions from the suspects, the judiciary spokesman said the cell had been set up by two men he named as Abderrauf al-Shaieb and Ali Mashaima, living abroad, through contacts with the five accused.

“They coordinated with military structures abroad, including the Revolutionary Guards and the Basij (militia) in Iran to train the recruits of the group in handling arms and explosives,” he said, without giving further details of the two alleged masterminds.

The spokesman said the plan was launched by sending cell members in small groups to Iran.
“One of them went to Iran where he met with a certain Assad Qassir, linked to the Revolutionary Guards and the Basij,” he said. The suspect received arms training and “sums of money from Iranian elements to finance the organisation.”

Four members of the cell were detained in Qatar and turned over to Manama, according to the interior ministry, which said the fifth Bahraini was arrested inside the country. The four had been travelling by car from Saudi Arabia.

They have been remanded in custody for a 60-day period to allow for an investigation to be completed, the judiciary official said.

Authorities seized “documents and a computer containing information of a security nature (and) details on certain vital sites, as well as dollars and Iranian rials,” an interior ministry spokesman said.
“They then confessed that they had left Bahrain illegally at the instigation of others,” planning to travel on to Iran via Qatar and Syria, to form an “organisation to commit armed terrorist acts in Bahrain,” he added.
Earlier on Sunday, the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) urged its member states to exercise “caution and vigilance” after the Bahraini announcement of the five arrests.

“The condition in the region and dangers facing member states require more caution and vigilance in order to thwart criminal attempts at destabilisation,” GCC chief Abdullatif al-Zayani said.

He welcomed the security cooperation between Bahrain and Qatar that he credited with having foiled the alleged attacks.

In an apparent reference to Iran, Zayani said the alleged plot reflected “desperate attempts ... of continuous interference in the internal affairs of the kingdom of Bahrain and other GCC countries.”
The Bahraini government crushed the pro-democracy protest with the help of GCC troops, drawing condemnation from Tehran.