Retired soccer star David Beckham, a Unicef Children's Goodwill Ambassador for 10 years, spoke at the United Nations (UN) assembly and shared a heart breaking story.
Beckham talked about a four year old girl, Viana, from Philippines, who drowned in 2013 during typhoon Haiyan.
He said, "On the night the typhoon hit the family was on their roof trying to protect themselves. The mother, tired, scared, exhausted, said to the father, can you please take Viana, so the father did." As he recalled the father took the two girls in his arms, unfortunately, he was "knocked off the roof by one of the waves."
After six hours of being unconscious the father woke up and realized he was holding only one girl, Venus. As Beckham recalled the sad story, he coughed, posed for a while and tried to compose himself before continuing.
He went on saying, ''This was the night of the typhoon. A day and a half later unfortunately Viana was found face down and unfortunately she had died. This was one of the most devastating stories I heard.''
David, who has 4 children, Brooklyn (16 years old) , Romeo (13), Cruz (10) and Harper (4), with wife Victoria Beckham, said that his experienced as a family man drove him to voice out on behalf of the world's children, who needed help.
In an interview with BBC's Laura Trevelyan, he said, "When you hear children speak and you see the devastation around the world... you don't ignore it." He further added that world leaders should prioritize children.
He also expressed his desire to have a world that is a better, safer place for children at the Voices of Youth assembly.
He left them with a powerful question to ponder on asking them, ''I want a world where children can grow up safe from war, violence, poverty and preventable disease - don't you?''
