In commemorating the 50 th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights this year, the international community bears witness to the growing support for human rights everywhere. The Declaration is the cornerstone of a global human rights movement embracing wide-ranging concerns within diverse cultures, religions, traditions and legal systems. But despite progress in all areas of human rights, the goals of the Universal Declaration remain elusive for the billions of the world s people who live in extreme poverty.
Poverty is a brutal denial of human rights.
Lack of access to safe drinking water and health care means that almost a third of the people in the world s least developed countries have a life expectancy of just forty years. In the poorest countries, thirty per cent of all children under five are malnourished, and thirty-eight per cent of all adult women are illiterate. Women in poverty, who are victims of the same deprivations as men, carry the additional burden of unequal access to services, legal status, and the financial credit necessary to break the shackles of poverty. The United Nations Development Programme strives to end extreme poverty, to empower poor people to escape from social exclusion and participate in public decisions that affect their lives. Increasingly, governments are requesting our assistance to develop policies and programmes to reform judicial systems, to promote democratization and to support a free and independent press and the respect of all human rights.