DHAKA: The United States is reportedly pressuring Israel to stop assassinating Iranian nuclear scientists, a number of whom have been mysteriously killed in a campaign thought to be carried out by Mossad.

According to CBS News, Obama administration officials have communicated to Israeli intelligence their wish for a cessation of the targeting of scientists in order to allow diplomatic negotiations aimed at rolling back Iran’s nuclear program to take their course.

While Israel has never officially acknowledged that it was behind the killings, it is widely believed that Mossad agents carried out the hits in an effort to slow down Iran’s nuclear development as well as to deter the country’s top scientific minds from cooperating with the government’s clandestine weapons program.

According to CBS News, some in the Israeli intelligence community also had second thoughts about continuing the campaign since they did not want to run the risk of the Mossad’s best spies getting caught.

The CBS News report was written by Dan Raviv, a journalist who along with The Post intelligence correspondent Yossi Melman wrote a book about the history of Israel’s intelligence services, reports The Jerusalem Post.

BDST: 1645 HRS, MAR 02, 2014