June 26, 2012 -- Updated 1200 GMT (2000 HKT)
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- Mary Robinson: A once in a generation chance to commit to sustainable development passed world by in Rio
- Leaders failed to rise to the challenge of breaking ties with old ways of doing things, she says
- Backsliding on reproductive rights is simply not acceptable, she says
Editor's note: Mary Robinson is President of the Mary Robinson Foundation - Climate Justice. She served as President of Ireland from 1990-1997 and U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights from 1997-2002. She is a member of the Elders and the Club of Madrid and serves as Honorary President of Oxfam International.
(CNN) -- I was happy to return to Rio, this beautiful city which I have visited several times. Twenty years after the first Earth Summit, I came to Rio, like many people from all over the world, to put the world on a different pathway -- one leading to sustainable development.
