The 2002 Bergen Declaration, along with the commitments made to the international community, eventually led policy-makers to take up the project again with renewed energy, aware of the fact that this time the Netherlands would have to meet the international requirements.
However, challenges remain regarding sustainability, particularly the follow up of the commitments made by communities (public declarations) and the mobilisation of resources to support abandonment efforts.
These Millennium Development Goals restated and consolidated the commitments made by the international community at a series of conferences and summits that took place in the 1990s.
"This handing-over process, as painful as it is for everyone, including the president, is a commitment we have made to the international community, and we have a responsibility to keep it," Olusegun Adeniyi, spokesman for Nigeria's president, Umaru Yar'Adua, told reporters this week.
A spokesman for the Australian Conservation Foundation said: "Abandoning the commitment Australia has repeatedly made to the international community to increase our target to 25% would make Australia a deal wrecker.
"[Enbridge] clearly has more work to do in order to fulfil the public commitment it has made to engage with aboriginal groups and local communities along the route".
The report therefore serves as a basic record of the commitment made by the international community, in respect to its children, for the decades ahead.
The international community must remind our government of the need to honour the commitments made when ratifying conventions.
