A VIDEO CALL
Sergeant Tang Shaoluo stayed up the whole night tossing and turning on his bed until morning. The Chinese soldier waited anxiously at the camp of the Chinese medical peacekeeping center in Monrovia, capital of Liberia, for a call from China.
Thousands of miles away Tang's wife was delivering their son. Around seven o'clock in the morning, when Tang heard the first cry of his son through a telephone line from China, he was actually calmer than he thought. But tears still streamed down his face.
When Tang saw his son's tiny face on his cellphone, he fell in love with him immediately. Tang wanted to be at his beloved wife's side, holding his son's warm little fingers.
But he could not.
Tang, together with the other soldiers at the camp, arrived at Liberia in September 2015 to take part in the peacekeeping mission in this west African country. Before departure, he learned that his wife was pregnant, but he decided to carry on with the mission.
In Liberia, Tang was helping with casualty evacuation and transporting doctors to local villages. Whenever he was off-duty, he would call his wife, who went through plenty of difficulty during the early stages of her pregnancy. He felt guilty for not being by her side.
"We will return to our home country in one month. I'm already imagining the scene when I embrace my son and my wife," he said.
"Before going back to China, I will do my best to fulfill my duties here in Liberia," the soldier added.
While his son is far too young to understand the significance of his father's work, Tang hopes to one day tell his son that he was away trying to make the world a better place for other, less fortunate children.
As we celebrate the Children's Day and strive to protect the rights of children, we should also keep in mind that brutal conflicts create new challenges. The world should spare no effort to protect innocent souls from the terror of war.
"Yet I keep them (faith), because in spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart."
These words were written by Anne Frank more than 70 years ago, who died in a Nazi concentration camp at the age of 15. To prevent the same tragedy from happening again, and to let our children keep their faith in humanity, we must all act now.
