The Right to ub Between 2001-2006, significant numbers of political opponents, journalists and suspected petty criminals were summarily executed. (F[AG, 2007) The United Nations Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions Philip Alston visited the country in 2007, and subsequently reported that "extrajudicial executions were widespread, and included government sanctioned killings of members of civil society groups, and vigilante killings of suspected criminals by a death squad in Davao." The United Nations Human Rights Committee (2003) and the Committees against Torture (2009), on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (2008), on the Rights of the Child (2009), and on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (2009), after reviewing the country's human rights record, likewise expressed concern over the enforced disappearances and extra-judicial killings of trade union activists, indigenous leaders, peasant activists, women and children, and human rights defenders and the lack of appropriate measures to investigate, prosecute and hold perpetrators accountable. ln response to widespread extrajudicial executions and enforced disappearances, the Philippine Supreme Court convened the National Consultative Summit on Ertrajudicial Kllings and Enforced Disappearances-Searching for Solutions, and subsequently promulgated twin rules: the rule on the writ of amparo (A.M. No. 07-9-121-SC, 2OOZ) and the rule on habeas data. (A.M. No. 08-1 -16-SC, 2008) Recent reports indicate that extrajudicial killings and enforced disappearances still occur under the current administration, although there has been a marked decrease in the numbers of persons killed or made to disappear. The existence of Filipino child soldiers also poses grave threats to children's right to life. The United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child (2008, 2009) expressed concern over the continued reported recruitment of children into government linked paramilitary groups and other non-State opposition armed groups to serve as combatants, spies, guards, cooks or medics. The Committee rued the absence of prosecution for recruitment or use of children in armed conflict, the lack of effective implementation, especially in conflict areas, of laws prohibiting and punishing recruitment and use of children in hostilities, and inadequate measures "to prevent small arms from coming into the possession of children or being sold to children or entities where the end user may recruit children." The Committee also expressed concerns over the continuing and increasing displacement of children and their limited access to social and health services, education and to development due to adverse effects of internal armed conflict and the impact of the internal armed conflict on children not involved in hostilities, particularly children living in Mindanao. The status of the right to life may also be measured through MDG indicators relating to MDG Goal 4, the reduction of child mortality. The table below shows a steady decline in under-five and infant mortaiity; yet the Committee on the Rights of the Child (2009) has expressed concern over high infant mortality rates and regional disparities in achieving progress in mortality rates, deficiencies in registering and reporting newborn deaths and stillbirths, the scale of under-nutrition (under-weight, under-height and thinness) among children, and children's limited access to quality health services in remote areas. 7