Amnesty International: Recognition Human Rights World's Indigenous Peoples Long Overdue

Posted August 11, 2006 in News

Amnesty International calls for support for the forthcoming 61st session of the United Nations General Assembly to adopt the UN Declationa on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. This would give Indigenous peoples the right "...to have meaningful control over their own lives, to maintain their distinct cultural identities, to live free from discrimination and the threat of genocide, and to have secure access to the lands and resources essential to their well-being and ways of life."

Amnesty International cite examples of the consequences of failing to have such a declaration e.g. indigenous women in Peru who give birth at home are fined and their babies denied birth certificates, meaning they have no legal identity. Plus there is no shortage of evidence that indigenous people are more likely to experience violence, suppression, sexual assaults, poverty, poor health. They are at greater risk of having their needs ignored when making infrastructure decisions or of becoming refugees when they are displaced from their native homelands. 

Amnesty International suggests three critical measures for immediate action:

• Adopting the draft United Nations Declaration of the Rights of Indigenous Peoples during the upcoming session of the UN General Assembly;

• Establishing fair and effective processes to provide timely resolution of outstanding land and resource disputes consistent with the rights of Indigenous peoples and other human rights protections in domestic and international law;

• Ensuring that Indigenous activists and communities can safety exercise their rights without fear of violence or arbitrary arrest and imprisonment.

Source: Amnesty International

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