West Asia crisis: No evidence that Iran has decided to build a nuclear weapon, says CIA

The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) said on Monday (Oct 7) that there was no evidence that Iran decided to build a nuclear weapon, and if it did, the United States (US) and its allies would most likely be able to detect such a step soon after it was taken.

Addressing the Cipher Brief security conference in Sea Island, CIA Director William Burns said that Iran advanced its nuclear program by stockpilinguranium enriched to near weapons-grade levels.

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Iran could quickly secure enough fissile material for an atomic bomb if it chose to and there would be less time for the outside world to respond, Burns added.

'No evidence thatKhamenei reversed his 2003 decision'

During Monday's security conference,Burns said there was no evidence that Iran's supreme leaderAyatollah Ali Khamenei reversed the decision that he took in late 2003 to suspend the weaponisation program.

Citing the American intelligence community, a report by NBC News on Monday said that Iran suspended this program at Khamenei's behest in 2023.

The CIA director pointed out that Tehran has developed the means of delivery for a potential nuclear weapon by building up its missile arsenal.

Since the US pulled out of the 2015 nuclear agreement between Iran and major powers known as theJCPOA in 2018, Tehran was in a "much closerposition to produce a bomb’s worth of ... enriched material for a single weapon," Burns further said.

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He added that when the JCPOA was in effect,it would have taken Iran more than a year to amass enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear bomb. “Now it’s probably more like a week or a little more to produce one bomb’s worth of weapons-grade material. So the risks have increased," he said.

Iran warns Israel against any attack

A day after Burns' remarks, Iran warned Israel against any attack on the Islamic Republic a week afterTehran fired a barrage of missiles on it, putting West Asia on the edge.

On Tuesday, Iranian Foreign MinisterAbbas Araghchi said that any attack on his country's infrastructure would be met with retaliation.

(With inputs from agencies)