The U.S. Senate has overwhelmingly approved a resolution that reaffirms U.S. efforts to stop Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.
The senators on Saturday voted 90-to-1 in favor of the non-binding measure, which they said should not be interpreted as an authorization for the use of military force or a declaration of war.
The decision comes a day after Senator Joseph Lieberman, the head of the U.S. Senate Homeland Security committee, accused Iran of sponsoring cyber attacks against major American financial institutions.
The web sites of JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America and Citigroup Inc. have been repeatedly disrupted over the past year due to a flood of incoming web traffic.
Lieberman told U.S. television network C-SPAN Friday he believes that the attacks were carried out by Iran's Quds Force, a unit of its elite Revolutionary Guards, not by random hackers.
He said he believes the attacks were a response to “increasingly strong” economic sanctions that the U.S. and its European allies have put on Iranian financial institutions.
The United States and several other Western countries have united to impose sanctions on Iran over its nuclear program, which they suspect is aimed at developing nuclear weapons. Iran insists its uranium enrichment program is solely for peaceful purposes.