But the annual, week-long conference is not expected to make new decisions about either Israel or other thorny issues for the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), such as the verification of the nuclear programs in Iran, Iraq and North Korea, spokesman Mark Gwozdecky told AFP.

Gwozdecky said the conference mainly endorses decisions made by the IAEA's executive arm, the 35-nation board of governors, which last week imposed an October 31 deadline on Iran to prove it is not trying secretly to develop nuclear weapons.

Still, the discussion on Israel should be heated.

A Western diplomat close to the IAEA said Middle Eastern states have in the past used the conference as a forum to vent their frustration over Iran and Iraq being attacked for alleged nuclear capabilities while the IAEA does nothing against Israel, which is believed to have developed nuclear weapons and has not signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

The Iranian ambassador to the IAEA Ali Akbar Salehi expressed this bitterly when he reacted to the agency imposing a deadline on Iran by saying it was unfair that "among those who have pursued and produced nuclear weapons ... Israel gets away with murder."

"It is pampered instead of being chastised," Salehi said.

The IAEA is at its conference to consider "Israeli nuclear capabilities and threat," according to the agenda.

A resolution may be tabled but the Western diplomat said this would be then withdrawn in a "procedural game where Arabic countries raise yet again the question" of why Israel has not signed the NPT, the safeguards agreement the IAEA verifies.

He said such resolutions have in the past been "obscure and hard to decipher but make a point by having the word Israel in them."

Gwozdecky said the conference would review the full range of IAEA activities and "lay out a work plan for the agency for the year to come."

This includes the IAEA's desire to resume verification that Iraq is not trying to develop nuclear weapons, a program for which it still has a UN mandate even if US authorities refuse to allow IAEA inspectors back into the country since a US-led war toppled Saddam Hussein.

The IAEA also wants its inspectors to return to North Korea, from where they were expelled in December as North Korea angrily withdrew from the NPT amid US charges it is developing nuclear weapons.

Besides these verification activities, the IAEA carries out cooperation programs to help people use nuclear technology, such as getting radiation therapy machines to developing countries to make cancer treatments more accessible, Gwozdecky said.

The third pillar of its activity is promoting nuclear safety. As part of this, it has focused since the terrorist attacks in the United States on September 11, 2001 on "helping countries identify their vulnerabilities" in nuclear security, Gwozdecky said.

This includes protecting against terrorists getting radioactive materials to use in so-called dirty bombs. These are conventional bombs laced with radioactive materials and designed to contaminate wide areas.

WAR.WIRE