Ahead of ‘World Poverty Day’ (Sunday 18 April) when the three main political party leaders will set out their plans to improve the lives of the world’s poorest, Amnesty International urged the three candidates to place human rights at the heart of their anti-poverty strategies.

Amnesty International’s UK Campaigns Director Tim Hancock said:

“We welcome the commitment shown by the three main political party leaders to tackle global poverty and to ensure that this is a central component within their election campaigning. However each party leader must ensure that they approach this issue by addressing the human rights abuses that underlie so much poverty.

“For example, 70 per cent of the 1.5 billion people living in extreme poverty are Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights, and their poverty is directly linked to gender discrimination. 

“Half a million Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights – one every minute – die in childbirth or from pregnancy-related factors, 95 per cent of whom are in the developing world. These avoidable deaths leave millions of orphaned Children's rights, destroyed families and scarred communities.

“When faced with facts such as these, it’s clear that governments cannot address the eradication of poverty without also targeting Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights’s inequality and the denial of Women's rights's rightss rights's rights's rights's rights’s human rights.

“Whichever political party leader becomes Prime Minister they should honour their promises to see the gap diminish between the world’s poorest and richest by improving the fundamental human rights violations that obstruct any real progress in eradicating poverty.”