U.S. military chief in Israel and discusses Iran

TEL AVIV (Reuters) - The Bush administration's top military commander held high-level talks in Israel on Monday after the Jewish state said it disagreed with U.S. intelligence findings that Iran had shelved a nuclear weapons programme.

Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Admiral Mike Mullen met Defence Minister Ehud Barak and heard briefings from Israel's spy services, which argue that Iran is working on a bomb and could have it by 2010, military sources said.

The U.S. National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), published last week, said Iran's nuclear weapons programme had been on hold since 2003 though its uranium enrichment facilities might produce enough fissile material for bombs in the next decade.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert criticised the report on Sunday and said Israel stood by its own intelligence assessment that Iran could be just two years away from having enough highly enriched uranium to make warheads for its long-range missiles.

Israel, which is thought to have the Middle East's only atomic arsenal, says a nuclear-armed Iran would threaten its existence. Iran denies seeking nuclear weapons and says it is enriching uranium only for use in generating electricity.

The Pentagon has played down the NIE findings.

"Despite the American intelligence report on the Iranian nuclear program, Iran still poses a major threat to the region," Mullen's spokesman, Captain John Kirby, told the Jerusalem Post.

"The Iranians have tried in the past to develop their nuclear capabilities, they can still develop them," he said.

Asked about the conflicting intelligence assessments, Kirby said that "like close allies, we don't always agree on certain issues".