The United Nations said that hundreds of millions of children across the globe were suffering exploitation and abuse, invisible to the eyes of the rest of the world.

In its flagship annual report on the state of the world's youth, the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) said such children live in dire circumstances and the picture painted by its report was "staggering" and "not a pretty one".

The report "takes you into the lives of hundreds of millions of children who are hidden from view, lost to statistics, programs and budgets and growing up beyond our reach," said UNICEF executive director Ann Veneman at its London launch on Wednesday.

"They are the world's most vulnerable children, trapped in circumstances that push them to the margins and shadows of society.

"They are children who are not registered at birth and grow up without an identity. They are children who suffer the death of one or both parents.

"They are children forced into adult roles when they should be at school or at play.

"And they are children who are exploited in the commercial sex industry or the worst forms of child labor or even as soldiers in adult conflicts."

Two teenage girls, one each from India and Romania recounted their personal stories of exclusion and exploitation.

Veneman said they had grown up in a world yet to fulfill the promises of a brighter future for children where families, communities and governments rise to their responsibilities.

"We have not given up hope of realizing this future.

"We have to begin by addressing the underlying causes of exclusion and abuse," she insisted.

The UN's ambition to slash extreme poverty can still become reality if real action is taken to reach such children, Veneman added.

Set out by world leaders at a UN summit five years ago, and renewed in September, the Millennium Development Goals begin with a pledge to reduce extreme poverty by half by 2015.

Veneman said meeting the goals depended on reaching vulnerable youngsters throughout the developing world.

"There cannot be lasting progress if we continue to overlook the children most in need."

Other targets include reducing the mortality rate among children under five years of age by two-thirds, ensuring primary schooling for all boys and girls, and a halt to the spread of AIDS and incidence of malaria.

In its opening pages, the UNICEF report argued for a "much stronger focus on ... children currently excluded from essential services and denied protection and participation".

"Unless many more of these children are reached, several of the Millennium Development Goals -- particularly the goal on universal primary education -- will simply not be met on time or in full," it said.

UNICEF appealed for "a massive push" to boost access to essential services for children and their families, starting with "quick-impact initiatives" that can kick-start development and reduce poverty.

Longer term, it proposed a stepping-up of initiatives "rooted in a human rights-based approach to development" to ensure that quick-impact policies lead to sustainable results.

Copyright © 2005 Agence France Presse

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