Twelve countries, among them the members of the G8 group of industrialised nations, are to attend a meeting in Morocco next week to discuss ways of preventing nuclear terrorism, the foreign ministry said on Friday.
Besides the G8 states (Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia and the United States) Australia, China, Kazakhstan and Turkey will be represented at the two-day meeting starting on Monday.
A ministry statement said that Morocco, as an observer country, and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) would take part in the first meeting of the "Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism" launched in July this year at the G8 Saint Petersburg summit by US President George W. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
There were no details as to the level at which participating countries would be represented.
The initiative seeks to improve the control and protection of nuclear and radioactive substances and nuclear installations to prevent terrorist nuclear activities, the ministry said.
The choice of Morocco to organise the meeting was "a recognition of its role in the fight against international terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction."