A/HRC/27/52 Convention will apply to those peoples “whose social, cultural and economic conditions distinguish them from other sections of the national community, and whose status is regulated wholly or partially by their own customs or traditions”, as well as those descended from pre-colonial populations and who retain some or all of their own social, economic, cultural and political institutions (art. 1, para. 1). 14. The Special Rapporteur notes with particular concern that a number of States have somewhat restrictive criteria relating to the recognition of indigenous status. That may result in approaches to land rights, socioeconomic policy and development, for example, that may fail to recognize the distinct circumstances, problems and experiences faced by indigenous peoples, including connections to land, distinct cultures and ways of life, discrimination and exclusion, and disadvantage. Approaches that do not recognize indigenous peoples or acknowledge that certain groups may face distinct challenges similar to other indigenous peoples around the world, do not allow for key tools and resources offered by the international indigenous framework to be employed — a framework that was developed precisely to respond to indigenous peoples’ concerns in a way that takes into consideration their distinct contexts and experiences. 15. The Special Rapporteur fully acknowledges that this is a sensitive topic in many areas, especially in the context of Africa and Asia, where many groups can be considered in a literal sense indigenous or native to the areas in which they continue to live. That concern was addressed by the Working Group of Experts on Indigenous Populations/Communities in Africa of the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, which observed rightly that “if the concept of indigenous is exclusively linked with a colonial situation, it leaves us without a suitable concept for analysing internal structural relationships of inequality that have persisted after liberation from colonial dominance”. Thus, the Working Group noted that the understanding of the term indigenous peoples “should put much less emphasis on the early definitions focusing on aboriginality ... The focus should be more on the more recent approaches focusing on self-definition as indigenous and distinctly different from other groups within a state”.1 16. There is therefore a need to implement a flexible approach that takes into account the core attributes that distinguish indigenous peoples from minority groups or other local communities. In that regard, the Special Rapporteur welcomes and adopts the approach of the previous Special Rapporteur, which focuses on the rights at stake and asks whether the international framework with respect to the rights of indigenous peoples proves useful in addressing the issues and concerns faced by the group in question. In particular, the previous Special Rapporteur stated that the mandate is relevant to those groups “who are indigenous to the countries in which they live and have distinct identities and ways of life, and who face very particularized human rights issues related to histories of various forms of oppression, such as dispossession of their lands and natural resources and denial of cultural expression” (A/HRC/15/37/Add.1, para. 213). In any case, in line with the practice of other international human rights mechanisms and the previous Special Rapporteur, the Special Rapporteur will not necessarily accept prima facie a State’s determination of a group’s indigenous status, without looking at other factors when examining the specific human rights situation of a group within a particular country. 1 African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, Report of the African Commission's Working Group of Experts on Indigenous Populations Communities, submitted in accordance with the “Resolution on the Rights of Indigenous Populations/Communities in Africa”, adopted by the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights at its 28th ordinary session (2005), pp. 92–93. 7