E/2008/43
E/C.19/2008/13
United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. These bodies,
together with the members of the Inter-Agency Support Group on Indigenous Issues,
should collaborate with States and indigenous peoples to effectively ensure that the
implementation of the Declaration is central to the design and implementation of
climate change policies and programmes.
139. The Permanent Forum expresses its appreciation to the Member States that
have already submitted information to it over the years, and encourages all States to
submit substantive information on measures taken to implement the United Nations
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
140. The Permanent Forum recommends that intergovernmental organizations such
as the Commonwealth Secretariat and the Secretariat of the Ibero-American
Summit, in cooperation with indigenous peoples, establish a working group to
promote the implementation of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of
Indigenous Peoples and the Plan of Action of the Second International Decade of the
World’s Indigenous People.
141. The Permanent Forum welcomes the ruling of the Inter-American Court of
Human Rights in the case of Saramaka People vs. Suriname (28 November 2007),
which aptly applies the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous
Peoples. The Permanent Forum urges the Working Group of the Organization of
American States, which is elaborating the draft American declaration on the rights
of indigenous peoples, to consider the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of
Indigenous Peoples as the minimum standard.
142. The Permanent Forum welcomes the decision of Bolivia to make the United
Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples national law and to include
it in the Constitution approved by the Constituent Assembly. The Forum expresses
its support for Bolivia’s implementation of the Declaration through national laws
and other means that lead towards the restitution of lands and territories to the
indigenous peoples of eastern Bolivia. The Forum encourages Ecuador and Nepal to
give due consideration to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of
Indigenous Peoples in their current constitutional processes.
143. The Permanent Forum, in accordance with article 26 of the United Nations
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (the right to the lands, territories
and resources that the indigenous peoples have traditionally owned, occupied or
otherwise used or acquired), requests States, United Nations agencies, churches,
non-governmental organizations and the private sector to fully respect the property
rights of indigenous peoples in voluntary isolation and initial contact in the Amazon
and the Paraguayan and Bolivian Chaco.
144. The Permanent Forum recommends that the United Nations system promote
understanding of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous
Peoples among decision makers, public officials, justice systems, national human
rights institutions and non-governmental organizations.
145. The Permanent Forum recommends that national human rights institutions and
other relevant national and regional bodies, including the African Commission on
Human and Peoples’ Rights, promote the rights of indigenous peoples and monitor
the implementation of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous
Peoples, and ensure that the international standards on indigenous peoples’ rights
are translated into national laws.
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