The Indigenous World 2021: Indigenous Youth: their role in protecting of their communities
Indigenous youth are aware that the world and its regions are going through a time of change marked, on the one hand, by key actors committed to respecting human rights and, on the other, by current movements ranged against the implementation of those rights.
The global situation in which Indigenous Peoples find themselves as a result of COVID-19 has specific features that differ from those of the general population, mainly due to geographical, cultural and historical conditions and contexts which, in turn, are different in each of the seven socio-cultural regions in which the world's Indigenous Peoples live.
It is important to remember that despite historical efforts to achieve recognition of the individual and collective human rights of Indigenous Peoples, they continue to live in a situation of particular vulnerability. Indigenous Peoples have demonstrated their resilience, mainly due to their own community processes and their lands and territories. Indigenous youth from different regions of the world have made great efforts to incorporate their perspectives into dialogues and policy agendas as a priority. In the current context of social and health emergency, there is a visible lack of progress in eradicating poverty and hunger and in promoting peace and justice in the world, to name just two of the Sustainable Development Goals. We must therefore demand real commitment from states to meet the objectives to which they have signed up.
