US believes Iran has not opted to build nuclear weapon

No evidence that Iranian leader has altered decision to halt weaponisation: US officials

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The United States still believes that Iran has not decided to build a nuclear weapon despite Tehran's recent strategic setbacks, including Israel's killing of Hezbollah leaders and two largely unsuccessful attempts to attack Israel, two US officials told Reuters.

The comments from a senior Biden administration official and a spokesperson for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) added to public remarks earlier this week by Central Intelligence Agency director William Burns, who said the United States had not seen any evidence Iran's leader had reversed his 2003 decision to suspend the weaponisation programme.

“We assess that the Supreme Leader has not made a decision to resume the nuclear weapons programme that Iran suspended in 2003,” said the ODNI spokesperson, referring to Iran's leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

The intelligence assessment could help explain US opposition to any Israeli strike on Iran's nuclear programme in retaliation for a ballistic missile attack that Tehran carried out last week.

US President Joe Biden said after that attack he would not support an Israeli strike on Iranian nuclear sites, but did not explain why he had reached that conclusion.

US officials have long acknowledged that an attempt to destroy Iran's nuclear weapons programme might only delay the country's efforts to develop a nuclear bomb and could even strengthen Tehran's resolve to do so.