US president Barack Obama will host a two-day summit on nuclear security beginning April 12, during which key global leaders including prime minister Manmohan Singh are likely to get together to discuss ways to secure atomic material and prevent acts of nuclear terrorism.
"On April 12th and 13th the (US) President will host the Nuclear Security Summit at the Washington Convention Center," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs announced yesterday.
"The purpose of the summit is to discuss steps we can collectively take to secure vulnerable nuclear materials and prevent acts of nuclear terrorism," he said.
In his speech at Prague, in April 2009, Obama had said that nuclear terrorism is the most immediate and extreme threat to global security. Last year at L'Aquila in July, he first announced his decision to hold the nuclear summit.
The gathering is aimed at developing steps to secure vulnerable materials, combat nuclear smuggling, and deter, detect and disrupt attempts at nuclear terrorism. Thereafter, in September, Obama also presided over a special meeting of the UN Security Council.
Obama has said he wants to secure all vulnerable nuclear weapons within four years.
"At April's Nuclear Security Summit, we will bring 44 nations together behind a clear goal: securing all vulnerable nuclear materials around the world in four years, so that they never fall into the hands of terrorists," Obama said in his State of the Union Address in January.
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