Prime Minister to attend Mandela’s memorial service in Johannesburg

Prime Minister Joseph Muscat will be joining at least 50 world leaders in Johannesburg for a four-hour memorial service honouring South Africa's first black president Nelson Mandela. Muscat is leaving Malta today.

While Mandela's funeral service will be held in his rural home village of Qunu on Sunday, media report that world leaders have been encouraged to attend the memorial in Johannesburg, taking place tomorrow.

US president Barack Obama, UK Prime Minister David Cameron and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani have already confirmed their attendance. According to the Telegraph, global stars such as Bono, Oprah Winfrey and the Spice Girl will be present.

Former US presidents Jimmy Carter and George W Bush and their wives, and Bill Clinton and his family will be present. It is understood that the Clintons will stay on for Sunday's funeral.

Buckingham Palace has confirmed that the Prince of Wales will represent the Queen at the funeral in Qunu on Sunday, along with the Duchess of Cornwall, but will not make the journey for Tuesday's memorial service.

Rouhani has said he will be at Tuesday's memorial service, along with Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president; Dilma Rousseff, the Brazilian president; Angela Merkel, the German Chancellor; Ji Xinping, the Chinese president and Mahinda Rajapaksa, the Sri Lankan president who recently, controversially hosted the commonwealth summit despite concerns over human rights abuses.

The Dalai Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader who met Mandela in Cape Town in 1996, will not attend. He has twice been refused a visa by South Africa, which is keen to court China as a strategic ally, although his spokesman has refused to say if he feared the same would happen again, the Telegraph reports.

In terms of security, the South African government intends implementing the same public transport system strategy used during the 2010 Fifa World Cup to ferry members of the public to the stadium. The public will not be allowed to drive cars to the event, which will be cordoned off for security reasons.

The stadium will be open from 6am and the proceedings are expected to start at about 11am. Many of the world leaders in attendance will share their memories of interacting with Mandela over the years.