Iqbal Masih and the Crusaders Against Child Slavery ANNOTATION
An account of the former Pakistani child labor activist whose life and unexplained murder has brought to the attention of the world the evil of child bondage.
FROM THE PUBLISHER
It is a rare thing for a child to become an effective social/political activist and even more unusual to have that activism reverberate around the world. Iqbal Masih's dramatic life story was widely told in the American media after his 1994 visit to the United States to receive the Reebok Human Rights Foundation "Youth in Action" Award and his murder a few months later. Susan Kuklin builds on those accounts and many more to explain the tragic yet fruitful life of the young Pakistani rug weaver who broke out of bondage to become a leader against child slavery in his own country and abroad. Kuklin draws on first-hand accounts of child laborers from several countries as she weaves the story of Iqbal's experiences into a larger picture of child labor engendered by the global economy. The grim lives of the "debt-bonded" children are shocking; the uneven political gains against child slavery, rather discouraging. Yet the courage, achievements, and legacy of these child advocates are the inspiring elements of the story. Many American children who met Iqbal joined the cause after his death. Using modern technology to recruit forces against the punitive labor system, children from several countries used the Internet to tell Iqbal's story and raise memorial money to construct a school for bonded children. The honesty, documentation, and timeliness of the unfinished story of both child slavery and the killing of Iqbal Masih are riveting. A stunning opening photograph of Iqbal commands the reader's attention, and many other wrenching pictures tell the plight of the children. The book�ultimately a call to action�concludes with a rich store of appended material, including a substantial list of Websites and organizations, short accounts of children's political action efforts, extensive chapter notes, glossary, bibliography, and index.
FROM THE CRITICS
School Library Journal
Gr 7 Up-Kuklin discusses modern child labor in developing countries where youngsters work in carpet factories, brick kilns, and workshops making jewelry and other goods. Poorly paid, uneducated, and often mistreated, these "bonded laborers" are made virtual slaves by their families' desperate poverty. The author focuses on two figures prominent in the struggle to combat the exploitation of children in Southeast Asia. Eshan Ullah Khan has led the efforts in Pakistan through his Bonded Labor Liberation Front, in cooperation with other organizations throughout the world. But the most colorful figure is Iqbal Masih, who at the age of 10 escaped from a carpet factory to become an articulate spokesperson. His death by shooting in 1995, on a return visit to Pakistan, ended his brief life but underscored the importance of the issue of child labor in the modern world. Numerous black-and-white photographs of children and labor leaders appear throughout the text. An appendix provides addresses of organizations. Kuklin's gripping story complements and adds human interest to Jane Springer's Listen to Us: The World's Working Children (Groundwood, 1997), which draws on UNICEF documents and materials. Together they provide excellent coverage for discussion of this tragic problem.-Shirley Wilton, Ocean County College, Toms River, NJ
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