E/2023/43 E/C.19/2023/7 91. The Permanent Forum welcomes the sponsorship by Brazil of a resolution on Indigenous Peoples’ health at the World Health Assembly in May 2023 and underscores the crucial importance of Indigenous Peoples’ participation. 92. The Permanent Forum calls upon UNESCO, including its Intergovernmental Committee for the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage, to step up its policies, safeguards and actions on the protection of Indigenous Peoples ’ tangible and intangible cultural heritage. UNESCO safeguards that reflect robust free, prior and informed consent protocols, as prescribed by the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, could contribute to the prevention of the destruction and desecration of Indigenous Peoples’ lands and sites by public and private enterprises. Examples include mining activities of the company Rio Tinto on the ancient Aboriginal site Juukan Gorge in Western Australia and the sacred Oak Flat of the San Carlos Apache Tribe in Arizona, United States of America. 93. The Permanent Forum underscores that direct access to financing for Indigenous Peoples is essential and requires changing strategies and methodologies to effectively enable the agency of Indigenous Peoples in pursuing their own development aspirations and as guardians of ecosystems. The Permanent Forum recommends that all donors increase direct funding, eliminating intermediaries where possible. To enhance accountability in financing for Indigenous Peoples, the Permanent Forum recommends that the Development Aid Committee of the Organisation for Econ omic Co-operation and Development include a policy marker in its statistical system for the reporting of development aid to facilitate tracking of funding allocated for Indigenous Peoples across all sectors. 94. The Permanent Forum clarifies its call on United Nations entities, in its report on the twenty-first session (E/2022/43-E/C.19/2022/11), to elevate the discussion on Indigenous Peoples to the highest possible governance level of their entities to ensure system-wide ownership and support for Indigenous Peoples’ rights. It encourages Member States to ensure that United Nations entity leaders appoint Indigenous Peoples focal points who report directly to their senior staff member on Indigenous Peoples. The Permanent Forum recommends that United Nations entities employ Indigenous Peoples for these positions. Dialogue with Member States (item 5 (b)) 95. The Permanent Forum welcomed the progress it heard from Member States on actions to implement the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. A discussion followed on how Member States could support the integrity, independence and work of the Permanent Forum and further its recommendations. The cross-cutting nature of Indigenous issues was noted by the Permanent Forum, and it requested Member States to mainstream Indigenous issues into multilateral processes of the United Nations. The importance of financing Indigenous Peoples ’ participation in these processes, as well as in the implementation of policies and measures decided by the multilateral processes, was underlined. 96. The Permanent Forum expresses its thanks to the Governments of Bolivia (Plurinational State of), Canada, China, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Denmark, Finland, Guatemala, Mexico, Nicaragua, Norway, the Russian Federation, Spain and the United States of America, as well as the government of Greenland, for having hosted previous pre-sessional and intersessional meetings of the Permanent Forum. The Permanent Forum stresses the importance of organizing such pre-sessional and intersessional meetings and reiterates its recommendation that States that have not yet done so consider hosting such meetings in the future. It also requests that the secretariat of the Permanent Forum organize pre-sessional meetings for future sessions of the Permanent Forum. 18/24 23-08492