Ex-CIA official sentenced to 3.5 yrs in prison for leaking state secrets

A former Central Investigative Agency (CIA) official has reportedly been sentenced to three and a half years in prison for disclosing classified information to a journalist in Washington.

While reading out the sentence, the judge in Alexandria Federal Court in the U.S. state of Virginia told former officer Jeffrey Sterling that he had a lot of talent and an ability to live a law-abiding life but added that the offences committed by him were severe, reported the BBC.

The judge said that a clear message had to be conveyed to other people at the agency and added that intelligence officers should understand that there's going to be a price to be paid if they disclose classified information.

The ruling marked the end of a long legal battle for Sterling. He was convicted of espionage in January for revealing classified information about a U.S. plan to disrupt Iran's nuclear programme while speaking to journalist James Risen, who writes for the New York Times.

Risen wrote about the plot in a book called 'State of War,' which was published in 2006. He claimed that American officials tried to create misleading guidelines for Iranian scientists that would trip them up as they worked on their nuclear programme.

The then-attorney general, Eric Holder, said that the revelations made by Sterling endangered people's lives and national security.