UNITED NATIONS (AP):
WORLD LEADERS are hoping to put a spotlight on the growing gap between rich and poor and the failure to find US$50 billion (euro41 billion) a year to help more than 1 billion people escape extreme poverty and start sharing global prosperity.
At two meetings yesterday leaders and ministers will focussed upon innovative ways to finance the alleviation of poverty and to ensure that millions of the world's poor don't get left behind by globalization.
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who spoke at both meetings, said recently that poverty is "morally and ethically unacceptable." He called for a global campaign "to free all human beings from hunger" and ensure that 24,000 people don't continue to die every day because they have nothing to eat.
POVERTY
The meetings are expected to help set the stage for next year's summit that the General Assembly is holding to assess progress toward meeting the goals that world leaders agreed on at the 2000 Millennium Summit. They include halving the number of people living in dire poverty, ensuring that all children have an elementary school education, that all families have clean water, and that the AIDS epidemic is halted - all by 2015.
