Whether it is the shocking statistics of 300,000 child soldiers worldwide, the more than two million children killed in conflict in the last two decades, an estimated 80 thousand children that die annually from violence from within the family in just one continent, or the 797,500children a year under the age of 18 in the United States alone that were reported missing with the possibility of being trafficked for sex or labor, these are all statistics on how children throughout the world today are suffering through mental or physical abuse.

Youth for Human Rights President, Dustin McGahee, is asking youth across the world who can make a difference to speak out on June 4, International Day of Innocent Children Victims of Aggression, to help those who can’t speak for themselves.

“This is the time for us, the youth of today, to raise our voices and make a difference,” says McGahee.“As long as we wait for someone else to do it, the job doesn’t get done. As long as we tell ourselves that we have plenty of time to make a difference in the future, millions of people continue to be pushed down into ways of life we could not imagine.

“Every day you wait, 270 more children IN THE UNITED STATES alone become victims of human trafficking, and may never again see a life with freedom again. Every hour you wait, more than 1,400 children die of starvation and preventable diseases each hour.

“How can we, the Youth of Today, guarantee our freedom, our freedom to sing our songs, our freedom to dance, our freedom to express ourselves with the way we dress or the way we comb our hair, when most of the world doesn’t have their own freedoms.

“Freedom is not self-protecting. It is something that must be constantly taught, promoted, and fought for. And we, the youth of today, are the ones who can do that.

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