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Home>Service> Awardees of Fervent Global Love of Lives Award> 4th Fervent Global Love of Lives Award 2001> Relieving the burdens of the children--Craig Kielburger
A fair child to become a global leader of tomorrow
      Craig Kielburger, male, born in 1982 in Toronto, Canada, president of FTC (Free the Children), Canada, a winner of “Roosevelt Freedom Medal” and “State of the World Forum Award”. In 1998, he was elected as one of “Global Leaders of Tomorrow” in the global economic forum in Switzerland, and was granted with the Governor's Award for Meritorious Service in October, 1998.
       On a morning of April 1995, at the suburb of Toronto, Canada, 12 years-old Craig happened to read a piece of news claiming that a 12 years-old Pakistani boy--Lqbal. Marci was sold as a slave. After years of hard work, he broke loose his chains and started to work for the benefit of child laborers, but finally shot dead.
      Since then, Craig was turned from a child of a bourgeois family into a revolutionist, who set up FTC along with some like-minded classmates; he also visited Bangladesh, Thailand, India, Nepal and Pakistan, where he found that the adults were a major factor to child labor issue. He believed that the 250 million child laborers in the world had to strive for their own rights.
      Today, FTC has become an international mutual help organization for children, and held activities in 25 countries. The major purpose of this organization is to release the children from exploitation, and assist the youth in achieving independence and improving the world. It’s believed that, the youth could improve the lives for the sake of themselves and others.
       Craig is a world-recognized fighter of children’s human right. In the past 6 years, he visited 35 countries, met many leaders and gave lectures to the children and entrepreneurs, etc. Also, he visited war-hit Yugoslavia and called for peace, whereby a ceasefire was once achieved.
      Craig believes that peace, social justice and economic development are crucial to the children’s education. Thus, he raised some funds to build up over 200 schools and water supply systems in Nicaragua, etc, while 50 million dollar medical instruments were donated.
      Craig was granted with 1999 golden medal of UNESCO and other many international awards. In the past five years, Craig, along with thousands of supporters, changed successfully the traditional concepts of youth, and also remoulded their self-confidence and willingness to help others.