The government has refused permission for Pakistan's participation in the two-day international conference on terrorism, organised by the Bharatiya Janata Youth Morcha, party chief Kishan Reddy said on Friday.

He said out of 83 countries that had been invited, 53 were sending their delegations.

United Nations Secretary General Kofi Ananan had also been invited, but he has deputed his observer Feodo Strcevic instead, Reddy said, adding that it was for the first time that a UN observer is attending a function organised by a political outfit.

Prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee will inaugurate the conference on February 10 while his deputy Lal Kishenchand Advani will address it.

He said Iraq too had been invited, but its delegation would not be able to attend the conference because of the current tension prevailing in the region. While South Korea is attending the conference, its North Korean counterpart is not coming, he said.

According to Reddy, experts on terrorism like Adam Dolnik and Virginia Mullin [USA] had been invited. Their Indian counterparts includs supercop K P S Gill, Major General Afsir Karim and foreign affairs analyst and former Indian high commissioner in Pakistan G Parthasarathy.

Reddy said Pakistan's 'double role' in fostering cross-border terrorism [in India] on one hand and participating in the fight against it on the other would be highlighted.

Significantly, the families of the victims of the terrorist attack on Indian parliament on December 13 have also been invited, as were seven members of a family of the victims of terrorist attacks in Jammu and Kashmir, Reddy said.