Jerusalem: Israel's Vice Premier Shimon Peres, credited with launching his country's nuclear programme and its policy of ambiguity, has said that it as achieved its goals of deterring its enemies.

"We didn't build a nuclear option in order to create a nuclear bomb," Peres said.

"The very suspicion that we have one is enough. It's intended for deterrence and it has achieved its goal. 'The Jerusalem Post' quoted him as saying in Paris," he said.

The Nobel laureate for peace and elderly statesman also said that Prime Minister Ehud Olmert did not say what was attributed to him.

Peres built Israel's nuclear programme in the 1950s when he was the Defence Ministry's director general and also formulated the policy of ambiguity by telling US president John F Kennedy in 1963 that "Israel will not be the first to introduce nuclear weapons to the Middle East".

He has been himself accused of violating the nuclear ambiguity policy in the past, most notably as prime minister in December 1995 when he said, "Give me peace and we will give up the nuclear programme".

Last Septmeber he repeated that by saying that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad should "bear in mind that his country could be destroyed, too." Olmert's statement hinting at Israel's nuclear capability has been criticized across the political spectrum, most notably by opponents within his Kadima party.