'India to stress on n-safety, security interface'

Seoul, March 26 (IANS) Indian Prime Minister Manmohan will stress on the interface between nuclear safety and security at the Nuclear Security Summit here Tuesday to address threats by "insiders", Indian officials said here Monday.

"The two issues are co-related in some fashion. The issue of safety has to be taken care of at the planning stage. Guns, gates and guards are not adequate. There is the question of access controls, and whenever needed, to address threats by insiders," R.B. Grover, principal advisor to the Department of Atomic Energy, told reporters here.

Questioned whether India's atomic energy programme faced any specific insider threats, he said the question of plant safety and the safety of material being transported there were two different things.

Speaking of the need for maintaining "minimum standards of safety", Foreign Secretary Ranjan Mathai hoped that all parties to the Convention on Nuclear Safety would sign and ratify the pact.

"The Nuclear Security Summit aims to strengthen international protocols," he said.

"I am happy at the message that India is in the mainstream (on this issue) and has ratified all the necessary protocols," Mathai added.

Manmohan Singh will be speaking twice at the summit, once at the lunch and subsequently at the second plenary, an official said.