Pakistan ready to play pivotal role for peace, stability in region: Qureshi

ISLAMABAD: “Pakistan is ready to partner any global efforts to promote peace and stability in the region and the world at large”, said Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi while addressing a ceremony to mark the United Nations Day here at Foreign Office.

The ceremony was also attended by the ambassadors of the various important states. Foreign Minister Qureshi lauded the UN steps for eradication of poverty and betterment in health sector.

Talking about UN’s peace mission, Shah Mehmood Qureshi said that Pakistan is playing pivotal role for peace and stability across the globe.

UN in its report about poverty alleviation, revealed that developing economies can cut poverty, if they improve girls’ health and sex education.

Girls in developing countries are less likely than boys to complete schooling because of forced marriage, child labour and female genital mutilation, risking the opportunities presented by their largely young populations, said the latest study.

“Over the next 15 years alone, developing countries together stand to gain or forfeit at least $21 billion, depending on whether or not they invest in the well-being, education, and independence of their 10-year-old girls,” reads the report.

“For 10-year-old girls, a potential tripling of their lifetime income is at stake. For the societies the girls are a part of, the reduction of poverty is at stake,” said the report.

Many girls fail to finish their education after getting married in early teenage, and UN urged countries to impose a minimum age of marriage of 18.

Every day, an estimated 47,700 girls get married before that age, report said.