Children

“The greatest Glory of a free-born People, Is to transmit that Freedom to their Children.” -William Harvard, author

Today we Americans gather and celebrate as a nation, our independence our freedom, taking pride in our country and our history. We honor those who have fought and died to give us the ability to walk this land without fear of persecution. A nation built on the back of injustice we stand for justice, the right to free speech, the right of religious choice, the right to live our lives how we choose to live. We may not always agree with each other, and we know that in no way is our country perfect, but we know that our children and their children live in a country where their opportunities are endless.

Thus while we sit here today with our friends and family celebrating our independence, let us remember the countless millions of children who are not so privileged. Those children around the world who are not free from the daily ravages of war and conflict, those who face gender inequality, children denied an education, children sold into slavery, those who suffer needlessly from preventable diseases and poverty. Forget not that these children are not always in some land far away, but here in our own back yard…here in the land of freedom.

Use your freedom and your voice to help those who cannot celebrate today among the summer fun of BBQ’s and sit under the night sky ablaze with fireworks. Remember that freedom is not free, and it is the right of every man, woman and child.

“Peace is no mere matter of men fighting or not fighting. Peace, to have meaning for many who have known only suffering in both peace and war, must be translated into bread or rice, shelter, health, and education, as well as freedom and human dignity - a steadily better life. If peace is to be secure, long-suffering and long-starved, forgotten peoples of the world, the underprivileged and the undernourished, must begin to realize without delay the promise of a new day and a new life.” - Ralph J. Bunche

The words of Ralph Bunche, reminded me one about the true meaning of freedom. For is one truly free if they must depend on others for the basic essentials of survival and humanity? War’s do no end overnight, homes are not suddenly rebuilt, the land is not suddenly lush, families are not instantly reunited, and so forth. Freedom does lead to peace, but only when freedom is accompanied by sustainable development that is led by those who’s futures depend on freedom and peace. It is this instable rebuilding after freedom that can lead to the demise of peace.

The axe of freedom does not just fall on peace, it falls on injustice and once injustice is gone peace is possible. But peace does not just happen, and it does not happen over night, it takes years to build stable peace. Peace is found on the back of education, gender equality, adequate healthcare, nutrition as well as democracy. Peace is found among children, as they have disproportionately been effected by the ravages of war, and therefore they too must be included in the process of rebuilding their country to ensure that a lasting peace is found. To find true peace no one must be left behind, no one must be forgotten!

“We call a child’s mind “small” simply by habit; perhaps it is larger than ours is, for it can take in almost anything without effort” - Christopher Morley

So often we over shadow our children, and fail to hear their thoughts and perspectives. By looking at a child as small minded serves only to underestimate their knowledge and their contribution to the development of our future. Children can truelly take in ‘almost anything without effort’, and thus we must not only work to see that we do not discount their contributions and abilities, but also see that the wealth of knowledge and information that we give children is what will best lead them towards a bright and peaceful future.

“They torched our house, they burnt our livestock, I have nothing left and don’t know where to start.”, said 22 year old Precious, a mother of a six-month-old baby (Telegraph).

According to UNICEF the continued violence is damaging Zimbabwe’s children and the grip it has on the countries children fears to only be tightening. Just last week the government run by President Mugabe’s ordered that all international aid groups and NGOs to stop their field work. On June 4th all aid agencies where ordered to stop all work, as they have been accused of working against Mugabe’s ZANU-PF party. The blocking of aid comes as the country is preparing for the presidential run-off election on June 27th.

Violence in the country arose after the the March 29th presidential elections, when Robert Mugabe was challenged by Morgan Tsvangirai, leader of the Movement for Democratic Change (MDC). Mugabe’s Zimbabwe African National Union (ZANU-PF), lost the majority in parliament for the first time since the country’s independence in 1980.

Children not spared post-election violence, as children and their families have been displaced from their homes, some 10,000 or more according to UNICEF. Children have been forced out of schools and worse children have been wounded and killed amid the violence and ciaos. Many, especially women and children, have fled to South Africa, such as the woman and child pictured to the right (NY Times).

“The net effect is as many as 500,000 children are now not receiving the health care, HIV/AIDS support, education assistance and food that they require. Many of these children are orphans,” UNICEF said in a statement this past week. As concerns about the children of Zimbabwe’s future rise, UNICEF’s Regional Director for Eastern & Southern Africa, Mr. Per Engebak, said:

“This appalling violence damages children, their potential, and Zimbabwe as a whole. It must stop and it must stop now. All authorities have a legal obligation to protect children; and as a signatory to the Convention on the Rights of the Child there is an international obligation.”

However some 400 AIDS service NGOs allowed to resume operations, nonetheless the news has left many weary and many others wondering if international aid will be allowed in. For now the children of Zimbabwe continue to suffer amid the reigning madness of Mugabe’s hold on the country and the violence that continues to show Zimbabwe’s fragility.


Please see my esteemed colleague Derek Catsam’s posts on the FPA Africa blog and his posts on Zimbabwe for more information on the current situation.

“Come, let us put our minds together to see what kind of lives we can create for our children.”
-Chief Sitting Bull (Lakota Indian Chief)

The future of the worlds children is in all our hands, it is not for one alone to strive to see that the children of today and tomorrow are given the lives they deserve. As a global community we must come together as one, united for a better world…a better future for all children, then and only then can we create the best future for our children.

They say that two heads are better than one, imagine the the lives we could create for the worlds children if we truly worked together as a global community to ensure that all children are brought up in a world where poverty, discrimination, slavery, preventable disease, conflict and war, are not part of their future.

Yes, even if we work together, we are a long way off from a world free of pain and anguish for our children. However we sit here in a world riddled by preventable diseases, gender discrimination, low literacy rates, child soldiers, child labor…and we can work together to change these for the better. While the root cause to most of our worlds evils is poverty, we can work to increase education and advocacy…we can work for empowerment. Empowerment is the true key to the future for the worlds children and their families.

While aid programs are indeed necessary and vital, we must see that the aid and support we are giving is not only suited to the situation and culture at hand, but sustainable. We can not apply a band-aid to the future and pray that it fixes itself, meaning one cannot just toss aid at people without looking at what they really need and what will really assist them in the future. Therefore we must look at each situation, culture and climate individually and provide sustainable development programs. For example we can not put into place job skills programs such as sewing if there is no market or the market is saturated, we cannot put the same literacy programs into place for children and adults, etc. So let us not look to give people aid, but give them empowerment and no longer look at development as helping the week, but giving resources and empowerment to the strong. This is the lives that we must create for out children.

To follow-up with yesterdays post, From Child Laborer to President, on Alejandro Toledo, who is now working with his organization Global Center for Development and Democracy, to combat inequality and poverty, especially among the countries child labors.

The Committee for Prevention and Eradication of Child Labor in Peru has estimated that 2.5 million children, most of them under the age of 14, are working throughout the country.

While Peru has ratified the ILO (International Labor Organization) conventions on the Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention (No. 182) and the Minimum Age Convention (No. 138). The two are part of the ILO’s 8 core conventions which govern fundamental standards on forced labour, discrimination, freedom of association, as well as child labour. The ratification of these conventions commits Peru to establish and define policies for which to combat child labor, the country remains in embattled in the fight to poverty for which fuels the countries massive child labor problem. In 2000 the country established the legal minimum age for child workers at only 12 years old, the youngest minimum age in all of Latin America. that same year the ILO reported that some 79414 children between 10 -14 years old and 738238 children between 15-19 years old were considered economically active (ILO, Yearbook of Labour Statistics, 2001).

One of the major issues, and long term effects, of child labor in Peru, is that it takes children out of school either temporarily or permanently. Thus children are either behind in their studies or uneducated once the reach adulthood, which then places children at an increased risk to continue the cycle of poverty and child labor with their own children. Children like siblings Ada 11, Luis 8 and Carla 6, whose family lives off collecting refuse, of which the children spend their days and nights on the streets scouring for. Their work on the streets to help their family survive has left all of the children one or two years behind at school (2 Million in Child Labor in Peru).

While the efforts of those like Toledo are on the right track, the road a head is long and winding, and much needs to be done in all areas to combat poverty. Families of children who remain in poverty or on the edge of poverty must feel they have viable options for their children and entire family, and until these needs are address, as with the issue of raising awareness to families of the long term effects of child labor, then the trend will continue at its current pace. Education and health are key factors in a child’s development and if these needs are not adequately met then the fight to end child labor will continue to remain a steep one.

For more information on the situation of child labor in Peru please see the following links:
UNICEF - Peru Statistics
Child Labor Facts and Figures from the Department of Labor (DOL)
Peru Laws Governing Exploitive Child Labor Report - DOJ
Worst Forms of Child Labour Data - Peru
Forced Labor in Peru - ILO (Spanish only)

In my post on August 1, 2007, UN Peacekeepers and the Abuse of Children, I reported on the failings of UN peacekeepers in the wake of recently emerging and wide spread abused in Liberia. However as I reported then then these abuses where not new in the world of the blue helmets, and nor are they isolated. In 2006 the Security Council states that Problem of sexual abuse by peacekeepers now openly recognized, Broad strategy in place to address it, stating that;

“We dishonour these brave men and women when we fail to prevent or punish those from within their ranks who victimize the very people peacekeepers are meant to protect and serve.”

The issues has once again re-emerged in the press and as before one of the issues has been the delay in both reporting and action taken to both prevent and prosecute perpetrators. However in the re-emerging reports of abuse it is not just peacekeepers who have been thrust into the spotlight as abusers, but civilian aid staff. As this past week abuses by UN peacekeepers and aid workers have been brought to light after a report, No One to Turn To: The under-reporting of child sexual exploitation and abuse by aid workers and peacekeepers, by Save the Children UK.

The report was composed of research done over the past year in Haiti, Southern Sudan and Ivory Coast, where the group conducted 38 focus groups with 250 children and 90 adults. Following the focus groups in-depth interviews and other research where conducted to compile the findings which included: children trading sex for food, forced sex, verbal sexual abuse, child prostitution, child pornography, sexual slavery, sexual assault and child trafficking. The age of the victims identified in the report where as young as six years old, however the majority of victims ranged in age between 14 and 15.

The report has made national and international headlines, as the news has left many dismayed and confused by the actions of those sent to protect those most vulnerable by the tragedies of armed conflict. In the recent spotlight individual stories of peacekeepers turned predictors have emerged, such as, Didier Bourguet, a U.N. official from France, who was found to have thousands of photos of him having sex with hundreds of young girls on his computers hard drive.

In a press conference Jane Holl Lute, Assistant-Secretary-General for Field Support, addressed the issue of punishing troops, who must be tried by their home countries, responsible for the sexual abuse of children, stating that the UN was working to increase dialogue and that “We can’t let up. We need to be vigilant.”, until all Member States are seeing the same picture and solution. Lute also made the following statement in response to the report;

“Save the Children has been an effective partner with us in bringing their perspective — which is different from our own — to this problem,” she said, voicing agreement with its call for a better reporting mechanism for victims. “We need to work with community leaders so that children and those who are abused can come forward in safety.”

In response the UN will investigate the sex abuse report, as Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told reporters he had “zero tolerance” for such behavior and said, “On all these cases which have been raised, we will very carefully investigate” and that the UN would take “necessary measures” where findings warrant.

The recent abuses and the longstanding impunity of those members of peacekeeping forces leave many to wonder who to trust and if there is any real safety from abuse. However the emergence of media and public outrage have once again thrust the issue into the spotlight and hope that the acknowledgment and punishment of those who have committed such grave crimes against vulnerable children will continue and we can brake the silence and impunity of abuse. Both the UN and International community must continues to take further steps to see that children, the most vulnerable victims of armed conflict, are adequately protected, which includes the prosecution of all predators, regardless of affiliation.

In a new report issued by Amnesty International, the 2008 State of the Worlds Human Rights, it has painstakingly come to light that after sixty years after the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that human rights still widely abused in dozens of countries. The forward of the report was entitled, “Broken Promises”, where it went straight to the point stating;

“World leaders owe an apology for failing to deliver on the promise of justice and equality in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), adopted 60 years ago. In the past six decades, many governments have shown more interest in the abuse of power or in the pursuit of political self-interest, than in respecting the rights of those they lead. “

The report, which comes out annually stated that people “are still tortured or ill-treated in at least 81 countries, face unfair trials in at least 54 countries and are not allowed to speak freely in at least 77 countries.” Countries with the most apparent violations included Zimbabwe, Myanmar and Sudan, all of which can be repeatedly seen littering the humanitarian news wires with report of violations, abuse or mistreatment their citizens.

“World leaders are in a state of denial but their failure to act has a high cost,” Irene Khan, the secretary general of Amnesty International, said in the press release accompanying the report.

The report singled out many countries, including pointing to the United States for violations of Article 11, “Everyone has the right to be presumed innocent until proven guilty according to law”, at Guantanamo Bay. The report stated that, as “the world’s most powerful state” it “sets the standard for government behavior globally.” But, Amnesty International said, the United States had “distinguished itself in recent years through its defiance of international law.” The US State Department has previously accused Amnesty International of using the United States as “a convenient ideological punching bag.” (The New York Times).

Violations against children cross over into all areas of the report, however under the reports ‘Global Themes’ one area stands out more than others was Stop Violence Against Women, for which it highlights the disproportionate abuse against women and girls, including rape, domestic violence, Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), etc. The report, while not disputing the significant progress made in the last sixty years, serves to illustrate the lack progress that has been made in many areas of human rights development and the long road that lies ahead if we are to work as a global world to eradicate human rights violations, especially against children.

Recent reports in Kenya of a Boy’s suicide reveals gaps in HIV education, the boy was in secondary school when he received his fateful results which was accompanied by no counseling. Soon after his results where received to committed suicide by ingesting lethal amounts of pesticide. The boys death which occurred last month has sparked grave concern over the gap in HIV/AIDS education in schools;

“Serious awareness-raising and counseling of students on HIV is non-existent in schools here; the little information they have is either gathered from public meetings, dramas or media. The results sheet was a death sentence passed to him; he was not counseled or offered words of hope, hence his belief that testing positive was the end of life,” “It is possible he also feared isolation by the community.” said one of the boy’s teachers, who preferred not to be named.

The boys death in Kenya was obviously trajic and highly preventable, but it leaves one to question how many other young people are committing suicide out of misinformation and fear of a life living with HIV/AIDS?  Education is a huge gap in many countries, especially in rural areas, and this case only highlights the urgent need to see that education and awareness programs are put into place in both schools and communities across Africa.

On this Memorial Day as we remember all those who fell in the fight for freedom, forget also not the children for which so many have died for. Those children for whom freedom has been fought for around the world, those who have been left orphaned by the violence of hate and war. Remember the children in America and across the globe, remember the fight for freedom and peace is the fight for the future.