World Day Against Child Labor

Ten years ago, the International Labor Organization (ILO) established June 12 as World Day Against Child Labor. The ILO, an agency of the United Nations, says on its website: "Hundreds of millions of girls and boys throughout the world are engaged in work that deprives them of adequate education, health, leisure and basic freedoms, violating their rights." The World Day Against Child Labor was launched as a way to highlight the plight of these children and support governments and social organizations in their campaigns against child labor.27--A Congolese boy pans for gold on a riverside at Iga Barriere, 25 km (15 mi) from Bunia, in the resource-rich Ituri region of eastern Congo, on February 16, 2009. #28--Children from a shanty area study at a roadside school in Hyderabad, India, on July 16, 2008. These street schools were organized to educate underprivileged children in an effort to prevent them from being engaged in child labor. #29--An Iraqi girl rides a donkey pulling a load of bricks at a brick factory in southern Iraq, on May 20, 2010. #30--Indian children work near their parents at a construction project in front of the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in New Delhi, India, on January 30, 2010. The children accompanied their parents to the work site, where if they are prepared to work, they will receive money for bread and milk and be provided with dinner by the contractor. #31--Shaheen, 10, works in an aluminum factory in Dhaka, Bangladesh, on November 16, 2009. #32--Mithun, 11, poses for a photo at a laterite brick mine in Ratnagiri district, about 360km (224 mi) south of Mumbai, India, on April 14, 2011. He is paid two Indian rupees ($0.04) per brick and carries an average of 100 bricks out of the mine per day. Each brick costs between 10-14 rupees ($0.22-$0.31), and weighs around 40 kg. #33--Boys working at a shop selling coal take a break in Yangonk, Burma, on May 27, 2012. #34--A young miner holds on tight to a rope as he descends into a deep narrow hole in the ground in a field in Anzanakaro near the south-western Madagascan town of Ilakaka on September 14, 2008. Local miners in the region work deep narrow holes where they scrape gravel and sand in the search for sapphires and fortune. According to an official Madagascan study, of the 21,000 thousand children living in the region, 19,000 belong to working families. #35--Habib, 8, works at a metal workshop which makes propellers for ships at a shipbuilding yard next to Buriganga River in Dhaka, Bangladesh, on January 10, 2012. #36--Ali Jan, 13, sells biscuits and sweets at Karachi's Clifton beach in Pakistan, on July 10, 2011. #37--An Indian child reacts to the camera as she collects recyclable spare parts at an automobile yard on the outskirts of Jammu, India, on December 10, 2011. India remains home to the greatest number of child laborers in the world despite efforts by successive governments to address the problem through compulsory education and anti-poverty programs. #