Standing tall, head held high, her dignity on full display. That’s the image of an empowered indigenous woman confronting discrimination and violence, saying “enough is enough” to the tragic impact of extractive industries and other development projects in her ancestral territories. The play of shapes that combines an indigenous woman’s silhouette with mountains, lakes, trees, and moon/sun...

Recent texts on the rights of indigenous peoples clearly show that indigenous ownership of marine and coastal spaces must be respected. In addition, their rights to their sea spaces must be guaranteed according to local perceptions, and this is masterly described by some articles in this book. This is expressed in the 2007 United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) in...

IWGIA is deeply concerned about the human rights violations that are currently happening in Jharkhand, India

Indigenous women and girls are the most vulnerable group in Bangladesh. They face multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination due to their gender, ethnicity, language, religion, class and geographic location.

The Samburu are a Nilotic community who reside in Northern Kenya. One cultural practice among the Samburu community is Girl-Child Beading. This practice sanctions a non-marital sexual relationship between Samburu men in the ‘warrior’ age group and young Samburu girls (usually between the ages of 9-15 years) who are not yet eligible for marriage. The practice has been in the community for centu...

This briefing note call attention to the ongoing situation of harassments and arbitrary arrests of human rights defenders in Loliondo in northern Tanzania.It offers an account of the recent events taking place in the area and background information. IWGIA believes that these developments are a cause of great concern. The detentions, harassment and trumped up charges undermine civil society and oth...

This urgent alert is based on the forceful evictions of Maasai pastoralists from their homes and grazing lands in Loliondo Division, Ngorongoro District in Northern Tanzania and the gross human rights violations that are being committed. The eviction operation started on the 4th July 2009 and was conducted by the notorious riot police, the Field Force Unit, with assistance of private guards from t...

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) addresses in this report State obligations with regard to extraction, exploitation, and development activities concerning natural resources. Through the implementation of its monitoring mechanisms, the Commission has consistently received information evidencing the human, social, health, cultural and environmental impacts of these projects on i...

This yearbook gives a global update on the current situation of indigenous peoples and their human rights and provides an overview of the main developments that have affected indigenous women and men in the course of 2015. In 54 country specific reports and 12 articles on international processes, indigenous and non-indigenous activists, experts and scholars provide their insight and knowledge on r...

This desk study documents the adverse impacts on indigenous communities from coal mining in the regions of la Guajira and Cesar, home to 90 percent of Colombia's coal production as well as several indigenous peoples such as the Wayuu, Yukpa and Kogui. SUMMARY Colombia is home to more than 90 indigenous peoples, comprising some 1,374,000 inhabitants or 3.2% of the national population. Recog...

Eviction of Indigenous Peoples from their ancestral lands is one of the most destructive and degrading mitigation strategy performed by modern governments in developing countries to address climate change. Armed police and soldiers are used to forcefully evict indigenous peoples to pave the way for investors and conservation in the name of climate change mitigation. The advent of climate change...

Written by Robert K. Hitchcock, Ben Begbie-Clench & Ashton Murwira This report looks at the situation of the Tshwa San living in western Zimbabwe. Information on this small indigenous minority group has so far been limited. Due to unique social and cultural barriers, the Tshwa face a number of constraints and challenges that need to be dealt with. Based on an extensive survey, the objectiv...

The report explores the evictions of pastoralists and other conflicts over pastoralists’ land in Tanzania, with focus on the past decade. Although most of these evictions and land based conflicts have been documented, the associated human and legal rights violations have increasingly lead to concern amongst civil society. A study was therefore commissioned to collate the available informatio...

The fact that energy projects are green does not necessarily mean they accept and protect internationally-recognised human rights norms. This report documents the adverse impact of Kenya’s goal to develop its renewable energy sector on indigenous peoples. It looks particularly at the geothermal and wind energy sectors in Kenya and describes the human rights impacts of a number of green energ...

The global goals and targets for sustainable development have been adopted but indicators are still being formulated. Indicators define what will be measured, and thus how the goals and targets will be implemented. In this position paper Indigenous peoples point at some of their most central concerns on indicators, implementation and monitoring of the 2013 development agenda. This Paper is ela...

In the Philippines, diversity within commonality among indigenous peoples is in itself a very complicated situation. Moreover, indigenous peoples understand their rights enshrined in laws more as violations than enjoyment, while local State authorities find difficulty in bridging the gap of addressing the development aspirations of the indigenous peoples with that of “national unity and developm...

The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples was adopted by the UN General Assembly on 13 September 2007. Since then, the importance of the role that indigenous peoples play in economic, social and environmental conservation through traditional sustainable agricultural practices has been gradually recognized. Consistent with the mandate to eradicate hunger, poverty and malnut...

In early 2013, a working group under the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights undertook research on the human rights situation of indigenous peoples in Tanzania. For the duration of two weeks, a delegation formed by the Working Group on Indigenous Populations/Communities met with representatives of ministries, embassies, UN agencies, international and local NGOs, including indigen...

Seven years after the adoption of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, The Indigenous World 2015 looks at the most significant developments and setbacks for indigenous peoples’ rights at the national and international level during the previous year and at indigenous peoples’ assessments of possible ways forward. With 69 articles and country reports, this edition of The In...

The success of the Post-2015 sustainable development goals (SDGs) will depend on the adoption of indicators that allow measuring progress towards targets and provide helpful information to policymakers. In preparation for the March 3-6, 2015 discussions at the UN in New York, the UN Statistical Commission compiled recommendations from the UN system. We applaud the inclusion of land rights indic...

Indigenous peoples play a crucial role in defending and protecting their forest land rights. The passing of the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers(Recognition of Forest Rights) Act of 2006 is a positive step towards the recognition of indigenous forest dwellers’ land rights and their role in forest protection. In line with the new legislation, IWGIA has developed a community-...

In early 2015, Maasai and Datoga citizens living in the Morogoro region of Tanzania were victims of deadly, ethnic violence. According to reports from local media, the assaults were instigated by public figures interested in acquiring land, and state authorities have not intervened to protect Maasai citizens. Police protection has instead been given to others who are illegally cultivating official...

The book addresses cases from each of these continents, examining the experiences of indigenous peoples with access to remedy when their human rights are affected by corporate activities. By drawing from these experiences it seeks to inform the actions of corporate and State actors in relation their business and human rights obligation to ensure that indigenous peoples have access to effective rem...

The present study aims to assess the poverty levels of the various indigenous groups in Nepal. It was developed to address the lack of existing disaggregated data and statistics on the socio-economic status of Nepal’s many indigenous groups. By presenting data on a broad set of socio-economic indicators for the many indigenous groups in Nepal and comparing this with data on other major caste and...

This diverse collection of essays and articles emerged from a workshop held in Oslo in March 2012, hosted by the Norwegian Center for Human Rights and the University of Oslo. The purpose of the workshop was to gather memories of how the international community had decided to examine the situation of Indigenous peoples, to explore, explain and celebrate their pioneering work within the United Natio...

This technical briefing authored by a number of international organizations working on food security, natural resources management and poverty eradication and endorsed by many local civil society organisations around the world strongly encourage governments to keep the profile of land and natural resources high in the document on sustainable development goals to be endorsed in September 2015. ...