Human rights

Indigenous peoples from around the world today issued a common position for the high-level plenary meeting of the United Nations General Assembly, also known as the World Conference on Indigenous Peoples, to be held at New York Headquarters from 22 to 23 September 2014.

In a call to action, the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues approved a draft decision today recommending that the Economic and Social Council rename it as the “Permanent Forum on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples”, at the close of a two-week session marked by a dynamic effort to preserve those peoples’ identity, ensure their rights and secure a fully fledged place on the global stage.

States Parties to the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families today elected by secret ballot seven members to the Committee that monitors the treaty’s implementation, to replace those whose four-year terms will expire on 31 December.

The international community’s attention to indigenous peoples appears to be waning, and, after 12 years of existence, the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues might be experiencing “fatigue”, the expert body heard today as it wrapped up its substantive work on the penultimate day of its twelfth session.

Including indigenous peoples in shaping the post-2015 development agenda and in closing persistent gaps in the current scheme was crucial, so that when the time came, the global community could “hit the ground running”, the Permanent Forum heard today during a panel discussion in which top United Nations policy advisers sketched plans for the much-anticipated follow-on proposal.

Enforced disappearances persisted around the world — most often occurring in total impunity — while the families of the victims struggled in anguish to learn the fates of their loved ones, States parties to the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance heard today.

Indigenous peoples should be highlighted as “the best guardians of the Mother Earth” in the outcomes of all preparatory processes leading up to next year’s high-level global conference on the topic, where the expectation was a “strong indigenous voice” on matters that affected them, the United Nations Permanent Forum heard today as it began its second week of work.

The World Bank promised to “listen with heart and soul” to the voices of indigenous people, its newly appointed Senior Adviser for Indigenous Peoples and Ethnic Minorities told the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues today, as meeting participants scrutinized the expressed commitments and project portfolios launched and supervised by global and regional financial institutions.

Chronic marginalization, insecurity, non-recognition of land rights, poor infrastructure and limited commercialization had all combined to make traditional pastoralists some of the poorest, most vulnerable and disenfranchised people in the world, speakers stated today as the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues considered the plight of those populations in Africa.

The rights of indigenous people across all areas of human endeavours must be respected, advanced and their participation guaranteed in formulating any decisions affecting them, speakers said, as the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues met today to take up the issue of human rights.