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An urgent call to leadership

BOX 2

Major goals of the 1990 World Summit for Children

To be acheived by the year 2000: Reduction of mortality rates for children under five. Reduction of maternal mortality rates. Reduction of malnutrition among children under five. Reduction of adult illiteracy rates. Provision of universal access to basic education. Provision of universal access to safe drinking water and sanitary conditions. Improved protection of children in especially difficult circumstances.

The price of failure

For all the gains made, the story of the 20th century is also about failed leadership - a lack of vision, an absence of courage, a passive neglect. The number of violations of children's rights that occur around the globe every day are staggering. They range from acts of omission - such as the failure to register births or provide access to health care services and primary school - to the deliberate abuses of armed conflict, forced labour and sexual exploitation. They are often hidden in families, rich or poor. They lead from one violation to another, exponentially. Every day that nations fail to meet their moral and legal obligations to realize the rights of children, 30,500 boys and girls under five die of mainly preventable causes, and even more children and young people succumb to illnesses, neglect, accidents and assaults that do not have to happen.

The devastating effects of war continue long after the conflict ends. This Iraqi woman lost her right hand and injured both legs when she mistakenly picked up a landmine.

Every month that the full - scale campaign needed to stop the terrifying HIV/AIDS pandemic is postponed, 250,000 children and young people become infected with the fatal virus.⁸

Every year, 585,000 women die of complications of pregnancy and childbirth that could have been prevented.

In the last year alone, approximately 31 million refugees and displaced persons⁹ - mostly children and women - were caught in the conflicts that ravaged the world, searching in vain for a safe haven, fleeing inhumane circumstances and ruthless attacks by mortar and machete, rape and dismemberment.

And every year that governments fail to spend what is needed to support basic social services and that development assistance is slashed, millions of children throughout the developing world are deprived of the access to safe water and sanitation facilities, and school and health services that are vitally necessary for them to survive and develop.

These are gross violations of the rights of children and women and as long as they persist - and the circumstances that give rise to them remain unchanged - human development will be compromised.

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