UN Secretary General Koffi Annan will arrive in Brazil's Sao Paulo state Saturday to attend the opening of the 11th United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD).
Annan will meet heads of state and government and other officials attending the conference before he leaves next Tuesday, the UN Information Center said Thursday.
The UNCTAD conference will be held from Sunday to Friday, and leaders of several countries will attend the event, along with the organization's Secretary General Rubens Ricupero.
They will discuss issues on world trade liberalization during the meeting, the Information Center said.
The 192-member UNCTAD is headquartered in Geneva. The quadrennial conference is UNCTAD's supreme decision-making body.
UNCTAD was founded in 1964 by the United Nations General Assembly as one of its permanent organs, against the backdrop that developing countries suffered severe economic setbacks due to discrimination in international trade by developed nations.
It has been assisting developing countries in better understanding the complexity of the multilateral trade negotiations and in formulating their positions since the 1990s.XINHUA NEWS AGENCY:
