E/CN.4/2006/16/Add.2 page 13 44. The discrimination faced by Ainu children at school is a serious concern. Ainu children are despised in such a strong way that some of them leave school because such persecutory treatments become unbearable. This affects the life of the entire family, which is sometimes forced to move to another region. Another consequence is that children tend to be ashamed of their identity: therefore, they tend to assimilate into the mainstream culture, and lose their culture and their pride in it. Many Ainu adults also hide their identity for fear of discrimination in finding employment or accommodation. 45. Discrimination against the Ainu is mainly based on old prejudices and mistreatment. The Former Natives Protection Law of 1899 was aimed at assimilating the Ainu by granting plots of land and turning them into farmers. This law, which was only abrogated in 1997, gave to the Ainu around six times less land than that given to the rest of the Japanese who migrated to Hokkaido. Today, the Ainu only live on 10 per cent of their ancestral land. Also, this law compelled them to lead a farming lifestyle completely alien to their traditional way of life, causing the decline of their ethnic culture. As of today, the Ainu are still greatly limited in their freedom to fish salmon, their ancestral traditional food: they can only fish for a very limited amount of salmon and only in designated areas where the salmon is of poor quality, and only after getting the authorization of the district, which in turn needs to get authorization from the Government. Such a procedure appears profoundly unjust: it prevents the Ainu people from eating their traditional food, and is humiliating, since it puts them in a position of dependence from the public authorities in the access to their ancestral alimentary resources. 46. On the identity side, the Japanese have built a number of prejudices to justify the historical oppression of the Ainu, spreading the idea that they were not intelligent, had a barbaric culture, and had a different appearance. These prejudices continue to be used to denigrate them and make them ashamed of their origins. However, after the adoption of the 1997 law, many of them are regaining their pride in being Ainu. 47. Concerning Ainu women, they want more space in the Ainu Association, out of the 20 members of the association, only one is a woman. An association of Ainu women was created, and is composed of 10 women. This association promotes the idea that education should start in the family, debates the role of mothers in education and discusses the discrimination women have faced during generations within the family. Many women explained that, in Japan in general and in the Ainu community in particular, men dominate and women are not allowed to speak on the same footing. 48. The Ainu community believes that the solution to their discrimination mainly lies in education: many Japanese on the main island do not know anything about Ainu history, or even that the Ainu exist, or they think the Ainu are foreigners. The Ainu need their true history and culture to be taught as part of the culture and history of Japan, which is not homogenous. But teachers do not teach the reality about the Ainu culture and history at school. On the contrary, many of them continue to transmit the same discriminatory image of the Ainu being inferior, for example by saying in front of a class that Ainu children can only count to 10. 49. Another solution lies in the recognition of the Ainu as indigenous peoples. The 1997 law is not considered to be sufficient since it is only on the promotion of culture. The Ainu want to see included in this law the recognition of their status as indigenous peoples, the promotion of their indigenous rights in conformity with international law, and the fight against the