Brussels, 15/03/2001 (Agence Europe) - The Secretary Ggeneral of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), Rubens Ricupero, and the European Commissioner for Development, Poul Nielson, a have signed an agreement over the arrangements for the third United Nations Conference on Least Developed Countries (LDC), which will take place at the European Parliament in Brussels, from the 14 to 20 May. The agreement foresees that the Union contributes to the logistics of the conference, notably through the allocating of a budget of EUR 4.5 million to the special UNCTAD fund in favour of LDC. In order to guarantee the success, the EU has already made a certain number of substantial undertakings, such as the "everything but arms" initiative and the action plan against transmissible diseases. The Commission hopes that during the conference as such, other concrete undertakings will be agreed upon that will help the LDC relaunch growth and development. Let us recall that the 49 ACP countries are classified as LDC.