The Indigenous World 2026: European Union Engagement with Indigenous Issues

Written on 22 April 2026. Posted in European Union Engagement with Indigenous Issues

The European Union (EU) is a political and economic union of 27 Member States. Its legislative and executive powers are divided between the EU main institutions: the European Parliament (co-legislative authority), the Council of the European Union (co-legislative and executive authority) and the European Commission (executive authority). In addition, the EU has its own diplomatic service, the European External Action Service (EEAS) with EU Delegations throughout the world.

The EU maintains trade relations with the whole world and is the biggest donor of development aid.^[1] Aside from the influence within the territory of its Member States and its influence in international organisations, the EU also has a global impact, being an international key player in the area of ​​human rights, development, and monitoring of corporate and environmental issues.

The EU forms part of the international process of promotion and protection of Indigenous Peoples’ rights. Five EU Member States have ratified ILO Convention 169^[2] and the EU supported the adoption of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) in 2007 as well as the Outcome Document of the World Conference on Indigenous Peoples in 2014.

In recent years, the EU has moved from a relatively passive position regarding the recognition of Indigenous Peoples’ rights to a much more active involvement in ensuring the effectiveness of these rights in its policies.^[3]

However, the shift in the European political balance and ongoing international tensions is threatening this commitment to Indigenous Peoples’ rights and risks rolling back the progress achieved in recent years.

This article is part of the 40^th edition of The Indigenous World, a yearly overview produced by IWGIA that serves to document and report on the developments Indigenous Peoples have experienced. Find The Indigenous World 2026 in full here

Progress on the EU efforts to confront violations of Indigenous Peoples’ rights in global value chains

2025 marked the start of a new European legislative term, with a newly-elected Parliament assuming office and inheriting a set of far-reaching reforms adopted at the end of the 2024 term. These reforms are designed to reinforce corporate accountability, environmental protection, and the sustainability of global supply chains. Directive (EU) 2024/1760 on corporate sustainability due diligence (Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive – CSDDD),^[4] Regulation (EU) 2023/1115 on deforestation-free products (EU Regulation on Deforestation-free Products – EUDR),^[5] and Regulation (EU) 2024/1252 establishing a framework for critical raw materials (Critical Raw Materials Act – CRMA)^[6] all form part of the European Green Deal strategy.^[7] This strategy seeks to reconcile ecological transition, industrial competitiveness, and the promotion of human rights within an increasingly globalised system of value chains.

These instruments did not emerge in a normative vacuum. Rather, they reflect a gradual awareness within European institutions of the structural human rights violations linked to transnational economic activities and, more specifically, of the harms suffered by Indigenous Peoples. The EU is not merely an abstract normative actor in this field; it is also a direct observer of these violations through its external action and cooperation instruments. European programmes dedicated to the protection of human rights defenders, such as ProtectDefenders.eu,^[8] as well as information-gathering mechanisms operating through human rights focal points in EU delegations, regularly document violations of Indigenous Peoples’ rights. These are frequently associated with extractive, agro-industrial, or infrastructure projects driven by private actors.^[9]

These findings of human rights violations have fuelled a political and legal dynamic aimed at moving beyond the limitations of soft law and voluntary corporate social responsibility. The justiciability of human rights, and particularly the rights of Indigenous Peoples, has progressively emerged as a central issue in inter-institutional debates. The right to Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC), enshrined in the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), has become a focal point of these discussions, crystallising tensions between economic imperatives, the sovereignty of third States, and the protection of fundamental rights.^[10]

In this context, the CSDDD represents the most fully developed expression of this normative shift. It seeks to impose a duty of due diligence on large companies operating on the European market that covers their entire value chains with regard to human rights and environmental impacts. The directive explicitly acknowledges, in its recitals, the particular situation of groups exposed to heightened vulnerability, among which Indigenous Peoples are included, linking their protection to UNDRIP and the principle of FPIC. This reference, stemming in particular from the work and amendments advanced by the European Parliament during the previous legislative term, reflects a clear political intention to align EU law with international human rights standards.

The EUDR reinforces this orientation by linking the fight against deforestation with the recognition of land tenure and land-use rights. By making access to the European market conditional upon compliance with the legislation of the country of production, including land-related laws, the regulation falls short of fully granting binding force to the rights of Indigenous Peoples as recognised by UNDRIP and international jurisprudence. Nevertheless, it opens a normative space in which Indigenous Peoples’ rights may be taken into account indirectly through the domestic legal frameworks of partner countries. The explicit references to Indigenous Peoples, UNDRIP, and FPIC in the recitals of the regulation demonstrate a growing understanding of the structural link between deforestation, land-grabbing, and the marginalisation of Indigenous Peoples.

The CRMA, finally, fits into this dynamic in a more ambivalent manner. While the adopted version no longer contains direct textual references to Indigenous Peoples, the preparatory work and parliamentary debates reveal genuine concern regarding the social and territorial impacts of strategic mining projects. Several amendments sought to introduce enhanced consultation requirements for Indigenous Peoples, or even explicit references to FPIC. Although these proposals were not retained in the final text, they contribute to a body of normative indicators pointing to an initial intention not to dissociate the security of European supply chains from the requirement to respect human rights.

Taken together, these three instruments reflect, at least during the upward phase of the European policy cycle, a willingness to strengthen the justiciability of Indigenous Peoples’ rights through indirect but binding mechanisms, particularly via economic law and internal market regulation.

Normative backlash and contemporary tensions: competitiveness, security, and the retreat from ambitions to protect Indigenous Peoples’ rights

2025 was marked by the fact that this dynamic of normative shift has, however, encountered growing resistance since the end of the previous legislative term, and even more so following the political reconfiguration brought about by the most recent European elections. The rise of conservative and far-right groups, combined with a geopolitical context shaped by the war in Ukraine, the dismantling of USAID, recurrent pressure from the United States, international trade tensions, and intensified competition for access to strategic resources, has profoundly reshaped the EU’s priorities.

In the name of economic competitiveness and the security of its borders and supply chains, the EU has initiated a retreat that leaves behind its ambitions to strengthen the justiciability of human rights. The repeated postponements of the EUDR’s^[11] entry into force, the delays affecting parts of the CSDDD’s requirements, and the discussions and adoption of “Omnibus”^[12] directives aimed at simplifying and lightening the obligations arising from the CSDDD all illustrate this trend.

The initial CSDDD regulation was scheduled to take effect on 30 December 2024 but it had already been postponed to the end of 2025. During 2025, it was revised again, with the new version adopted on 18 December 2025, which postponed its entry into force to 30 December 2026 for all operators, except for small and micro‑enterprises, which will benefit from an additional one‑year grace period (30 December 2027).^[13]

The CSDDD Directive itself was the subject of a Commission proposal on 26 February 2025, known as the “Omnibus I package”, which was adopted in April 2025 under the somewhat explicit name Omnibus I, “Stop‑the‑Clock”. This directive postponed the transposition and implementation of the first phase of the CSDDD by one year.^[14] Subsequently, in December 2025, the European Parliament adopted a provisional agreement to drastically reduce the sustainability reporting and due diligence framework.^[15]

Under this revised framework, the scope of application was significantly raised: only companies with more than 5,000 employees and a turnover of EUR 1.5 billion will now be subject to due diligence obligations. The requirement for a complete mapping of value chains was replaced by a logic based on “reasonably available information”. The obligation to implement a climate transition plan was removed, and potential sanctions were capped.

This proposal also provides that the new due diligence regime will only enter into force from July 2029, thereby delaying its practical application by several years.^[16]

The CRMA provides another revealing arena for these tensions. Despite analyses and warnings issued by civil society, notably the Sámi Council, ^[17] highlighting the risks and shortcomings of this legislation, it has not been subject to any proposals for postponement or revision, unlike the EUDR and CSDDD regulations. The designation of extractive projects as “strategic projects” allows for the acceleration of administrative procedures and the provision of enhanced political and financial support, even in sensitive contexts. Several supported or proposed projects concern Indigenous territories, both within and outside the EU. The removal of explicit references to FPIC in the final text of the regulation, combined with this logic of acceleration, raises serious concerns about the erosion of procedural and substantive safeguards for Indigenous Peoples. This concern is not hypothetical: projects under the CRMA, such as the Nussir mine in Sápmi, Norway, and the Geir mine in Sápmi, Sweden, have already been denounced for violating the rights of Indigenous Peoples, highlighting the tangible risk that the EU could actively support initiatives that infringe upon human rights.^[18]

Presented as necessary to preserve the competitiveness of European companies in relation to their international counterparts, these initiatives call into question the durability of enhanced due diligence mechanisms, particularly where they concern rights perceived as legally or politically sensitive, such as FPIC.

This normative retreat should not, however, be interpreted as a complete break with the previous trajectory. Rather, it reveals a structural tension between two competing narratives: on the one hand, that of an EU aspiring to act as a normative power, promoting human rights on a global scale; on the other, that of a Union unsettled by the rise of conservatism, in which arguments centred on security, economic sovereignty, and inward-looking priorities are gaining increasing traction. Within this intermediate space, the rights of Indigenous Peoples appear as adjustment variables, sometimes mobilised as reference standards, sometimes relegated to the background in favour of strategic objectives deemed more pressing.

In this contrasted context, the role of the existing human rights protection system implemented by the European administration becomes decisive. The continued presence of explicit references to Indigenous Peoples, UNDRIP, and FPIC in certain instruments, combined with the broader architecture of EU fundamental rights law, provides interpretative levers capable of curbing an overly abrupt dismantling of recent normative achievements. The key question is therefore no longer solely that of the legislator’s intent but rather the capacity of the EU system, through interpretation and administrative and judicial implementation, to withstand contingent political shifts.

Mathias Wuidar is a human rights lawyer. He works as representative to the EU for the Indigenous Peoples Center for Documentation, Research and Information (Docip).

This article is part of the 40^th edition of The Indigenous World, a yearly overview produced by IWGIA that serves to document and report on the developments Indigenous Peoples have experienced. Find The Indigenous World 2026 in full here

Notes and references

^[1] European Commission, “International Development Aid,” European Commission – Economy and Finance, accessed 23 February 2026, https://economy-finance.ec.europa.eu/international-economic-relations/international-development-aid_en

^[2] Denmark (1996), The Netherlands (1998), Spain (2007), Luxembourg (2018) and Germany (2021)

^[3] For further information, please refer to International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs (IWGIA), “European Union Engagement with Indigenous Issues,” in The Indigenous World (annual editions 2018–2025), IWGIA, https://iwgia.org/en/resources/indigenous-world.html

^[4] Directive (EU) 2024/1760 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 13 June 2024 on corporate sustainability due diligence and amending Directive (EU) 2019/1937 and Regulation (EU) 2023/2859 https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/dir/2024/1760/oj/eng

^[5] Regulation (EU) 2023/1115 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 31 May 2023 on the making available on the Union market and the export from the Union of certain commodities and products associated with deforestation and forest degradation and repealing Regulation (EU) No 995/2010 https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2023/1115/oj/eng

^[6] Regulation (EU) 2024/1252 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 11 April 2024 establishing a framework for ensuring a secure and sustainable supply of critical raw materials and amending Regulations (EU) No 168/2013, (EU) 2018/858, (EU) 2018/1724 and (EU) 2019/1020 https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2024/1252/oj/eng

^[7] For further information on the European Green Deal strategy, please refer to: https://commission.europa.eu/strategy-and-policy/priorities-2019-2024/european-green-deal_en

^[8] For further information on the European Union Human Rights Defenders Mechanism, please refer to: https://protectdefenders.eu/

^[9] For further information on the development of these legislations and the context of their creation, please refer to Mathias Wuidar, “European Union Engagement with Indigenous Issues”, in The Indigenous World 2025, edited by Dwayne Mamo, IWGIA, 2025. https://iwgia.org/en/resources/publications/5773-the-indigenous-world-2025.html

^[10] Although EU trade and cooperation agreements typically contain human rights clauses aimed at respecting fundamental freedoms in partner countries, the new corporate sustainability due diligence framework goes beyond these soft‑law commitments by making companies legally accountable for human rights impacts throughout global supply chains; this shift has triggered political reactions from several trading partners, including strong criticism from the United States under President Donald Trump (see: https://www.hrw.org/news/2025/08/29/eu-us-trade-deal-threatens-eu-corporate-accountability-law), calls to weaken the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD) on grounds of sovereignty and trade competitiveness (See: https://brusselssignal.eu/2025/12/eu-is-trying-to-export-its-disastrous-economic-model-warn-us-lawmakers-and-industry/), as well as a joint letter sent by the ambassadors of several producing countries—including Brazil, Colombia, Ghana, Indonesia, Malaysia, Nigeria, Paraguay, and Peru—protesting the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR), denouncing it as insufficiently respectful of national laws (See: https://www.fern.org/publications-insight/article/ambassadors-protest-the-eus-deforestation-free-regulation-ferns-partners-react-2563/).

^[11] The Council formally adopted a targeted revision of the EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR), simplifying due diligence, postponing its application to 30 December 2026, excluding low-risk printed products, and mandating a Commission review by April 2026 to assess administrative burden and potential legislative adjustments.

Council of the European Union, “Deforestation: Council Signs Off Targeted Revision to Simplify and Postpone the Regulation,” Consilium, 18 December 2025, https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2025/12/18/deforestation-council-signs-off-targeted-revision-to-simplify-and-postpone-the-regulation/

^[12] European Commission, “Omnibus I – First Omnibus Package on Sustainability,” legislative train document, published 26 February 2025: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/legislative-train/package-simplification-business/file-first-omnibus-package-on-sustainability; and: Council of the EU, Simplification: Council gives final green light on the ‘Stop-the-Clock’ mechanism to boost EU competitiveness and provide legal certainty to businesses, press release 285/25, 14 April 2025: https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2025/04/14/simplification-council-gives-final-green-light-on-the-stop-the-clock-mechanism-to-boost-eu-competitiveness-and-provide-legal-certainty-to-businesses/pdf

^[13] European Commission, Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD), Commission webpage, accessed January 2026 : https://commission.europa.eu/business-economy-euro/doing-business-eu/sustainability-due-diligence-responsible-business/corporate-sustainability-due-diligence_en

^[14] European Commission, “Omnibus I – First Omnibus Package on Sustainability,” legislative train document, published 26 February 2025: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/legislative-train/package-simplification-business/file-first-omnibus-package-on-sustainability; and: Council of the EU, Simplification: Council gives final green light on the ‘Stop-the-Clock’ mechanism to boost EU competitiveness and provide legal certainty to businesses, press release 285/25, 14 April 2025: https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2025/04/14/simplification-council-gives-final-green-light-on-the-stop-the-clock-mechanism-to-boost-eu-competitiveness-and-provide-legal-certainty-to-businesses/pdf

^[15] “Sustainability and due diligence: MEPs agree to delay application of new rules,” press release, European Parliament, 3 April 2025: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/news/en/press-room/20250331IPR27557/sustainability-and-due-diligence-meps-agree-to-delay-application-of-new-rules

^[16] “Council and Parliament strike a deal to simplify sustainability reporting and due diligence requirements and boost EU competitiveness,” press release, Council of the EU, 9 December 2025: https://www.consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press-releases/2025/12/09/council-and-parliament-strike-a-deal-to-simplify-sustainability-reporting-and-due-diligence-requirements-and-boost-eu-competitiveness

^[17] Sámiráđđi, “EU Promoting Strategic Mining Projects on Sámi Lands: A Devastating Betrayal of Indigenous Rights and Sápmi’s Future,” Saami Council: https://www.saamicouncil.net/news-archive/statement-crma

^[18] For further information on strategic projects under the CRMA, or to check whether the EU supports projects in your country, please refer to: https://single-market-economy.ec.europa.eu/sectors/raw-materials/areas-specific-interest/critical-raw-materials/strategic-projects-under-crma_en

Further, it is noteworthy that, when asked by Member of the European Parliament Carola Rackete: “What evidence does the Commission seek and accept to show that free, prior and informed consent has been correctly obtained?”, the Commission, in its written response, referred only to “meaningful consultations”, manifestly failing to comply with the obligation to obtain the consent of the Indigenous Peoples concerned.

Please find the Question for Written Answer (E-001220/2025) to the Commission (Rule 144 – Carola Rackete, The Left) here: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/E-10-2025-001220_EN.html

And the Answer given by Executive Vice-President Séjourné on behalf of the European Commission here: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/E-10-2025-001220-ASW_EN.html

Tags: Global governance