G8 agenda: Nuke safety, Arab and Africa

The situations in Africa and the Arab world will be high on the agenda at the two-day summit, as heads of state from 10 African nations will attend an outreach session. Chairman of the African Union Commission Jean Ping will also be in attendance.

However, the summit will kick-off with a working lunch under the topic of "Solidarity with Japan and Global Economy", where G8 leaders will show their support for quake-struck and tsunami-hit Japan.

This will be followed by the first working session during which the participants will discuss nuclear safety.

Tougher international safety standards for nuclear power will be discussed and it is expected differences in opinions between participating countries may emerge.

The Fukushima nuclear disaster after the massive Japanese earthquake in March has created a rift in the G8, with three of its members losing faith in nuclear's promise of almost limitless clean energy.

With many Japanese convinced nuclear stations pose an enormous risk in a quake-prone country, the country's electorate is unlikely to accept any future construction of nuclear plants.

Germany, which is already committed to scrapping nuclear power within roughly 25 years, is even more strongly anti-nuclear.

Italy is another G8 member state against nuclear power. The country established a policy to discontinue building nuclear sites after the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.

But the US, Russia, Canada, France and Britain remain nuclear advocates.

After the nuclear issue, the second formal discussion will focus on Internet regulations, a topic on which France and the UK may have different views.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy pushed for this year's G8 summit to include the Internet on its agenda, the first time the topic has been discussed at this level. But British Prime Minister David Cameron, as reported, may oppose France's suggestions on how to regulate the cyber world; Kazinform cites China Daily.

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