What are the Millennium Development Goals?

The Millennium Declaration was adopted in September 2000 by 189 world leaders who commited to "free all men, women and children from the abject and dehumanizing conditions of extreme poverty" by the year 2015. For that purpose, eight Millenium Development Goals (MDGs) have been drawn that cope with a variety of issues such as the promotion of education, maternity health care, gender equality, poverty reduction policies, child mortality, AIDS and other fatal diseases. These goals were set for the year 2015 with reference to the international situation prevalent in 1990.