New Delhi hosts Sherpa meeting on nuclear security

New Delhi, Jan 16 (ANI): Representatives of 49 nations are expected to participate in the Sherpa meeting being held in New Delhi with an aim to discuss matters pertaining to nuclear security and prepare the blueprint for the upcoming summit in Seoul.

"It gives me great pleasure to extend to you a warm welcome to this Sherpa meeting to prepare for the second nuclear security summit hosted by the Republic of Korea in March this year. We are indeed very happy to note that 49 participating countries and four international organisations are attending this Sherpa meeting," said Foreign Secretary Ranjan Mathai.

Mathai further said that he is confident that this meeting would yield concrete results.

"We had productive discussions during the last Sherpa meeting in Helsinki, I am confident that in New Delhi further progress will be made on the draft-communicate of the 2012 Nuclear Security Summit in Seoul with a view to its early finalization," he added.

It is for the first time that India has hosted the Sherpa meeting, which comes ahead of the second Nuclear Security Summit (NSS) to be held in Seoul in March.

This Sherpa meeting is expected to take up discussions on global matters relating to nuclear terrorism and how it can be tackled and the measures that need to be taken to protect the nuclear facilities.

Dignitaries from Japan are also expected to take up for discussion safety management of nuclear power plants and their learning after the Fukushima disaster during the two-day international meet. (ANI)