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	Indigenous Women make their voices heard at the Generation Equality Forum by International Indigenous Women's Forum (FIMI)   Several Indigenous Women leaders have participated in various events of the Generation Equality Forum, held virtually in March 2021.   Indigenous Women of the world have been able to raise their voices, demands and strategies by participating at this global meeting intended to define the transformative actions that will be taken over the next five years to achieve gender equality.   Through the virtual events, participants have discussed the role of Indigenous Women in the face of climate change, the impact of COVID-19, the various types of violence and inequalities that we still face as Indigenous Women and Girls, and the direction the feminist movement should be taking.   “Nobody wants a feminist movement made up only of academics and the upper class. Feminism is rooted in diversity, in dialogue,” claimed Tarcila Rivera Zea, Quechua activist and chair of the Board of Directors of the International Indigenous Women’s Forum (FIMI-IIWF).   This event has been a great opportunity for the particular contributions of Indigenous Women to be included in the global agenda towards gender equality.   The Need for an Intersectional and Decolonial Perspective in the Feminist Movement   Throughout the event, intersectionality has been the word uniting the voices of Indigenous Women. “The challenge is to make sure that, beyond the good intentions, intersectionality actually be put in practice once the Forum is done,” stressed Myrna Cunningham, co-founder and vice president of the Indigenous Initiative for Peace.   “The colonial model keeps gaining strength around the world, and if we are not serious about applying intersectionality, everything will be ever more homogeneous,” she added.   Throughout their years of struggle, Indigenous Women have been gaining important rights, especially in normative law through the adoption of international and national legal instruments that pressure States into adopting specific policies.   However, as highlighted by Norma Don Juan Perez of the National Coordination of Indigenous Women of Mexico (CONAMI), “all progress made is overshadowed by racist, non-intersectional policies”, which continue to fuel the different types of violence against Indigenous Women.   “That is why we need to transform the way power is exercised,” stated Norma Don Juan. “Our ability to solve problems has to be recognized, and we have to be considered as subjects of law, able to define how we want to exercise our rights.”   Tarcila Rivera Zea has provided some practical solutions to include intersectionality and face the specific challenges of Indigenous Women. One of them is to push forward the general recommendation of the CEDAW Committee on the Rights of Indigenous Women and Girls.   It is also important to promote economic opportunities, and for Indigenous Women’s organizations to receive funding more directly. This requires believing in their ability to manage resources, as pointed out by Monica Aleman, senior coordinator of the Ford Foundation’s BUILD Program. Finally, it is important to build agendas that reaffirm this intersectionality, so as not to leave out any sector of society.   Indigenous Women Are the Best Guardians for Mother Earth   There is a certain consensus around the fact that Indigenous Women are those most affected by climate change. Crop failure caused by floods and extreme droughts undermines the progress made with the issue of food security. “Climate change is a nightmare in my country,” acknowledged Hindou Oumarou Ibrahim, co-founder and president of the Association of Indigenous Women and Peoples of Chad.   But at the same time, Indigenous Women are in a position to bring solutions. In the community, “they are the agents of change, they have a deep knowledge of the climate and of their environment, and they can offer environmental solutions. They should be included at the negotiation tables for the national plans,” added Hindou Oumarou Ibrahim.   With the COVID-19 crisis, for example, the value of healing practices, spirituality and traditional medicine has been reaffirmed.   Additionally, Indigenous Women as guardians and defenders of Mother Earth have long been insisting on “the concept of ecological and environmental violence”, which has “challenged and expanded the established definition of violence,” explained Nicaraguan Indigenous Leader Myrna Cunningham.   For the challenges posed by both climate change and COVID-19, Lucy Mulenkei, Vice President of FIMI, has a recommendation: “Don’t work alone. We need to work with boys and girls, youth, families and communities.”   Violence and Inequalities persist against Indigenous Women and Girls   Although great progress has been made with regards to specific regulations and legislation, leading to the creation of government policies and programs to prevent violence, there is still work to be done for these words and intentions to actually become reality.   Black, disabled and/or Indigenous Women continue to be the ones with the highest mortality criminalization rates.   “The problem is the structural and economic inequality from which the violence stems,” explained Elvira Constantina Pablo Antonio, from the National Network of Indigenous Women of Mexico.   For Adriana Uex, young Indigenous Woman and a member of the National Coordination of Indigenous Women CONAMI, “racism and discrimination are the barriers” that are raised with these inequalities, which are in turn translated into a poor access to public health systems, the denial of our rights to make decisions about our own bodies, or child marriages.   Another type of violence affecting Indigenous Women very acutely is the appropriation of indigenous territories by transnational corporations, a situation that is aggravated by state-sponsored violence and impunity.   “We need to provide global answers” from an “intercultural and feminist” perspective, recommended Norma Don Juan Perez, from CONAMI.   According to Sandra Creamer, Executive Director of the National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Women’s Alliance and a member of FIMI’s Board of Directors, corporations and states must be held accountable.   “We have to establish international standards and focus our efforts around Human Rights conventions and guides,” she said.   With the COVID-19 pandemic, these inequalities have worsened. The ultra-rich have made huge profits while the wealth gap has widened. “Many Indigenous Women have had to migrate from rural areas to the city, where they do not have access to services,” explained Teresa Zapeta, Executive Director of FIMI.   This leaves us with “a complicated context, where we see progress at the same time as intensifying violence”, concluded Norma Don Juan Perez. This is why Indigenous Women are making a call to action.   In the words of Elvira Pablo, from the Youth Generation Equality Working Group: “We are tired of hearing pretty words and commitments without seeing immediate action. Now is the time to start acting.”   http://fimi-iiwf.org/indigenous-women-make-their-voices-heard-at-the-generation-equality-forum/?lang=en http://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2022/06/end-violence-against-indigenous-women-and-girls-un-expert   # 'Intersectionality is the concept that all oppression is linked. More explicitly, the Oxford Dictionary defines intersectionality as “the interconnected nature of social categorisations such as race, class, and gender, regarded as creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage”. Intersectionality is the acknowledgement that everyone has their own unique experiences of discrimination and oppression and we must consider everything and anything that can marginalise people – gender, race, class, sexual orientation, physical ability'.   http://www.womankind.org.uk/intersectionality-101-what-is-it-and-why-is-it-important/   Sep. 2021   To protect the land is to protect indigenous lives    Ketty Marcelo Lopez is an advocate for the rights of indigenous women. In her native Peru, Ketty and her colleagues are campaigning for their rights to ancestral lands and for women to have an equal role in decision-making.   ‘We are indigenous women in resistance. ‘We are a living culture, fighting for our identity, for our territories, and for the environment.’   Ketty Marcelo Lopez has made it her life’s work to give a voice to the voiceless. Born in the rainforest of the Peruvian Amazon, she is one of the country’s 3.2 million indigenous women and a lifelong campaigner for the rights of her community.    Since 2009, Ketty has been working with Peru’s National Organization of Indigenous Andean and Amazonian Women (ONAMIAP) – an organization campaigning for the rights of Peru’s indigenous women.   This is a battle increasingly being waged on one key front: land.   ‘My mission and the mission of ONAMIAP is to combat climate change and ensure food sustainability for Peru’s indigenous peoples,’ Ketty explains. ‘And the foundation for all of that is land rights – encompassing everything is the fight to defend our territory.’   Peru’s indigenous peoples are stewards of some of the most biodiverse ecosystems in the world, with more than half covered in forests and more than 7,500 endemic plant species.   But these forests and their inhabitants are under threat as, without legal recognition, indigenous territories are vulnerable to land grabs by government and industry.   From 2001-20, the country lost 3.39 million hectares of tree cover and, in recent years, the government has leased more than 80 per cent of the Peruvian Amazon to oil and gas companies despite much of this land being inhabited by indigenous groups.   ‘There has been so much logging going on, most of the forests have been cut,’ Ketty says. ‘The river is contaminated. There are fewer fish, and there is less food.   ‘And now we are seeing the impact of climate change. The heat is brutal, we can no longer work the land for long before we have to stop and find shelter.’   For indigenous people such as Ketty and the women ONAMIAP represents, the impact of land grabs and deforestation has been catastrophic.   ‘For our community, the land is everything,’ Ketty explains. ‘It is the place where our ancestors rest. It is the place where we build our identity.’   Because of this intimate relationship with the environment, the stakes for indigenous peoples are high.   Ketty continues: ‘When we fight to protect the land, the forest, and the biodiversity – we also fight for our lives.’   Access to land is one of the most powerful determinants of human wellbeing.    People with secure access to land are less likely to experience hunger or poverty, enjoy better health outcomes, an enhanced status in the community, and improved quality of life.   This is reflected in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with land ownership recognized as fundamental to eradicating poverty and ending hunger, and important for gender equality.   Land rights are a critical element of forest governance. Secure legal backing of these rights empowers individuals and communities to protect their land and natural resources.   Omaira Bolaños, director of Latin America and Gender Justice Programs at Rights and Resources Initiative, explains: ‘When we give people legal rights, we equip them to better manage the forest and protect it from harm.’   But such rights are not universally recognized. More than half the land on the planet is indigenous and community territory used and managed by up to 2.5 billion people. Evidence from Latin America shows forests within these territories are less vulnerable to deforestation and more effective carbon stores than the nearby state-run forests.   But only one-fifth of indigenous land is legally recognized. The failure to acknowledge communal ownership of land, the state’s desire to profit from natural resources, and complex land registration processes, all stand in the way of the recognition of indigenous land rights.   Without legal protection, indigenous lands are at risk of seizure by commercial and state interests. Omaira explains:   ‘We see industry claim the land of indigenous people because their ownership is not legally recognized. There is nothing to tell them not to. They can easily go in and sweep away communities..’   http://forestgovernance.chathamhouse.org/publications/forest-voices-to-protect-the-land-is-to-protect-indigenous-lives http://www.transparency.org/en/blog/indigenous-world-day-corruption-discrimination-peru-guatemala   June 2019   'Hear us, see us': a call to the UN from Indigenous women, by Lorena Allam for Guardian Australia   June Oscar has used a speech to the UN in Geneva to demand the federal government take action on the rising rates of Aboriginal women in jail.   Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women represent 2% of Australia’s female population but make up 34% of all women in prison, June Oscar told the UN Human Rights Council.   “The root cause is that Indigenous women continue to experience disproportionate levels of trauma and intersecting forms of discrimination which cut across lines of race, gender and socioeconomic status,” Oscar said.   “There is a direct connection between the fact that 80% of Indigenous women in prison are mothers and the rapidly increasing rates of the removal of Indigenous children from families into out-of-home care,” she said.   Oscar called on the government to fully implement the recommendations of the Australian Law Reform Commission report Pathways to Justice.   The report was commissioned in 2016 said the prison rates for Aboriginal people were a “national tragedy”.   But the government has made no formal response to the report, which was tabled in parliament almost 18 months ago, despite consistent calls for action.   A coalition of more than 35 human rights, justice and community organisations wrote to the government in September last year.   “We cannot let another generation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people lose their futures, their dignity and – for some – their lives because of inaction by Australian governments,” said the letter signed by Amnesty, the Australian Council of Social Service, the Law Council of Australia, Unicef, national Aboriginal legal and social services, legal academics and others.   The Law Reform Commission report recommended a national justice reinvestment body, support for justice reinvestment trials around the country, and national criminal justice targets.   June Oscar said: “We must invest in prevention through provision of wrap-around supports to our families, and we must ensure that real alternatives to incarceration become viable options.”   “We need increased investment in health and the social determinants of health. We need to bring an end to punitive welfare compliance regimes which impact Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people disproportionally.   “We must reform what has become an increasingly punitive justice system that incarcerates our people at 10 times the rate of other Australians, and invest in effective rehabilitative supports.   “We must halt the development of a second stolen generation by supporting Indigenous families and communities to care for themselves and their children, and by ensuring that state governments adhere strictly to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander child placement principle.   “Our children must grow up in culture, not in care outside of our communities,” Oscar said. “We must overhaul the Native Title Act, which in its current form does not provide for a just and equitable native title system.   “All these measures are about giving full effect to our human rights, rights which are enshrined in international treaties which the Australian government has ratified or endorsed.”   http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/jun/29/hear-us-see-us-a-plea-to-the-un-for-indigenous-women Visit the related web page
	Land-grabbing in Asia displaces indigenous peoples and destroys environment by Francisco Cali-Tzay Special Rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples   Indigenous peoples in Asia are facing massive displacement, the destruction of their environment and rising poverty due to land-grabbing, says a UN human rights expert.   "Large-scale development projects including dams, mining, monocrop plantations and logging are increasing in the region and causing serious human rights violations as indigenous peoples lose their traditional lands and resources," said the Special Rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples, Francisco Cali-Tzay, referring to a regional consultation organised by his predecessor in Bangkok. It will be presented to the Human Rights Council in September.   "States must take measures to prevent violence and the criminalisation of indigenous peoples arising from the exercise of their rights and the defence of their lands and territories. Strengthening the regulation of private companies is essential."   Indigenous peoples lack legal recognition of their status and there is widespread failure to protect their lands and respect their rights to participate and to be consulted in decisions affecting them.   Across the region, indigenous peoples, in particular women and persons with disabilities, continue to be discriminated against and marginalised. For States to put into action their development pledge of leaving no one behind, the obligations towards indigenous peoples must be at the forefront and reflected in policy measures and in the allocation of resources.   "The promotion of the rights of indigenous peoples and their traditional practices, are key to achieve sustainable development, combat climate change and the conservation of biodiversity," the Special Rapporteur said.   * View report on regional consultation here: http://undocs.org/A/HRC/45/34/Add.3   http://www.icj.org/traditional-customary-justice-systems-updated-and-expanded-icj-compilation-of-standards-launched/ http://www.icj.org/gf2020a/ http://www.icj.org/gf2018/   COVID-19: Indigenous peoples’ voices must be heard, says UN expert   Indigenous peoples have largely been left out of COVID-19 responses globally and the pandemic is likely to worsen inequalities and racism in wider society.   "Indigenous peoples are likely to be among those hardest hit by the impending global recession, extreme poverty and escalating rates of malnutrition," said Francisco Calí Tzay, the UN Special Rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples, said in a report to the General Assembly in New York.   The UN expert called for pandemic emergency protocols to be developed jointly with indigenous peoples, consistent with their individual and collective rights. And, he said, response plans must recognise and incorporate traditional indigenous knowledge.   The UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples is the most widely-recognised comprehensive international standard, and its implementation is key to ensuring indigenous peoples are not left behind in the COVID recovery process, Calí Tzay said.   "The pandemic truly highlights how the failure to recognise the collective dimension of indigenous peoples' rights can result in many indigenous communities being less resilient to the health and economic impacts of the global crisis," he said.   The UN expert said he had received over 150 direct and indirect testimonies in compiling the report. "One of the trends I observed is that those indigenous peoples who are able to decide how best to protect their communities and to use their collective lands, including for subsistence farming, are the least affected by the virus and the disruption of the global economy," he said.   The report also highlights how resilience to the pandemic is increased when indigenous peoples can exercise their right to administer their own health and community programmes, complemented by accessible and non-discriminatory national health and education systems.   "In practice, indigenous peoples are denied the necessary support to operate their own institutions and in many cases left with no choice but to exclusively rely on their own traditional medicine to cope with the virus," said Calí Tzay.   The report also highlighted that where national protocols had been adopted to address the particular situation of indigenous peoples, they had often come late and were underfunded, and without the necessary consultations to ensure the specific resiliency and needs of indigenous peoples were properly addressed.   "Now is the time for governments to give indigenous peoples an active role in national recovery planning and implementation, ensuring protection of their collective identity and cultural survival, and recognising that indigenous wisdom can guide the path for the wider society towards a recovery that is in harmony with nature, also reducing the risk of future similar pandemics," he said.   * Access the report: http://www.undocs.org/en/A/75/185 Visit the related web page
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