Afghanistan ranked last for the third year in a row, 194th in the Global Children’s Rights Index, which is published annually Dutch Foundation KidsRights in collaboration with Erasmus University Rotterdam.
The index evaluates countries party to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child on five criteria: survival, health, education, protection and enabling environment. In the 2026 ranking, Afghanistan scored only 0.214 points out of 1 possible, losing even to Chad and Guinea, writes “Fergana”.
The country’s weakest indicator was the “Enabling Environment” category (0.010 points). Low scores were also obtained for education (0.286), protection (0.549), survival (0.454) and health (0.635).
The report also notes that the situation of children is aggravated by humanitarian and economic crises. According to UNICEF, 21.9 million people in Afghanistan will need humanitarian assistance in 2026, including 11.6 million children. Almost 942,000 children under five years of age require treatment for severe acute malnutrition.
Afghan authorities rejected the study’s findings. Taliban government deputy spokesman Mullah Hamdullah Fitrat called the report “baseless and far from reality,” saying authorities were paying sufficient attention to protecting children’s rights, promoting education and health care, and enforcing a ban on hazardous forms of child labor.
KidsRights CEO Mark Dullert, commenting on the study’s findings, said millions of children around the world continue to suffer due to armed conflict, unsafe environments and harsh living conditions.
The leader of the 2026 ranking was Luxembourg, scoring 0.871 points. The top three also included Iceland (0.867), and third place was shared by Monaco and Germany (0.866 each).
Russia was in 151st place, China – in 81st, Ukraine – in 36th, Israel – in 110th. The United States is not included in the ranking because it has signed but not ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.
The Global Children’s Rights Index has been published since 2013 and is considered the only international ranking that annually assesses the implementation of children’s rights based on comparable statistical data.
