KUALA LUMPUR, Dec 7 (AFP) - The inaugural East Asian summit will be a broad-ranging strategic grouping which could tackle issues including international terrorism, the Malaysian hosts said Wednesday. "ASEAN... believes that it should be in the driver's seat in that the East Asia Summit will be open and outward looking," the foreign ministry said in a statement as it prepared to host the December 14 meeting of 16 regional leaders. The East Asia Summit will be preceded by the annual two-day summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Senior officials from ASEAN met on Wednesday as the week-long event got under way. Malaysia outlined an ambitious agenda for the inaugural meeting which will be attended by 16 leaders from ASEAN, China, Japan, South Korea, Australia, India and New Zealand. "The East Asia summit will be a forum for dialogue on broad, strategic issues of relevance to East Asia as well as other regional and global issues," it said. "Discussions could focus on regional and international issues of common interest and concern such as international terrorism, energy, infectious diseases, sustainable development, poverty reduction and others." ASEAN officials also confirmed the criteria for membership to the summit, which has been a vexed issue in the run-up to the event. The three elements are that applying nations: be a full dialogue partner of ASEAN; have signed up to a "Treaty of Amity and Cooperation" and have substantive relations with ASEAN. At the end of Wednesday's meeting, the leaders will sign a "Kuala Lumpur Declaration", a communique which will be watched closely to see which direction the grouping intends to move in. jsm/sls/ben