The world is watching this child bride prepare for her wedding day.

For millions of girls and young women around the world, their wedding day is not a happy one.

Instead, it is a day that marks the end of their childhood. It puts them at risk of rape, violence, abuse and exploitation.

It is the end of their freedom.

This is the message behind a new campaign from UNICEF hoping to end the practice of child marriage.

A powerful new video, made in collaboration with popular bridal blog Bridal Musings, let’s you take a look inside Lilly and John’s wedding day.

Lilly took the day off school for the occasion, she looks beautiful — if a little sad — as she walks down the aisle toward her future husband John, 24 years her senior.

Lilly is 11.

There are more than 700 million women alive today who were married as children, more than a third before their 15th birthday.

Most don’t look like Lilly, but that doesn’t mean their lives don’t matter.

This isn’t just happening in one or two far off places, it’s happening in countries all across Asia, Africa and the Middle East.

According to UNICEF, this year alone 15 million girls will be married before they turn 18.

These child brides will likely experience domestic violence, miss out on education, contract HIV/AIDS or be forced to have children before they are ready.

“The world has awakened to the damage child marriage causes to individual girls, to their future children, and to their societies,” UNICEF Executive Director Anthony Lake said in a statement.

“This new global programme will help drive action to reach the girls at greatest risk – and help more girls and young women realize their right to dictate their own destinies. This is critical now because if current trends continue, the number of girls and women married as children will reach nearly 1 billion by 2030 – 1 billion childhoods lost, 1 billion futures blighted.”

The programme will use the hashtag #endchildmarriage and you can find out more about it here.