Salim Ahmed Salim, secretary-general of the Organization of African Unity, said reducing poverty, child mortality and disease while improving access to education should be some of their key goals. A forum ahead of Monday's gathering gave African children a chance to share their experiences and to discuss their problems. They had their differences. Carol Bellamy, head of the United Nations Children's Fund, said African leaders need to lead for children. Many African countries are plagued by abject poverty, illiteracy, poor health services and wars.
Children often pay the price.
In Egypt, more than 4 million children believed to be working in hazardous industries and services are sometimes paid one-sixth the normal wages and face poisoning, burns, beatings and sexual abuse, experts and children rights advocates said in a conference last month. Most children smuggled from countries such as Benin, Mali and Burkina Faso are sold instead to coffee, cocoa and cotton plantation owners in better-off countries. Others end up as domestic workers, market vendors and prostitutes. More than 12 million African children have been orphaned by AIDS, and the number is expected to jump to 40 million by 2010. In February, the largest rebel group in Sudan, the Sudan People's Liberation Army, demobilized about 2,500 child soldiers who were flown in a U.N. airlift to camps outside the war zone.