The Forum regrets that Indigenous Peoples living in environmental ecosystems and latitudes other than tropical and subtropical forests are ineligible for funding, including the $1.7 billion pledge made at the twenty-sixth session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The Forum advises the Forest Tenure Funders Group to promote a dialogue with United Nations mechanisms on the rights of Indigenous Peoples when defining the ongoing and future process of funding for Indigenous Peoples.
The Permanent Forum takes note of the upcoming World Congress of Protected Areas, to be held in Barcelona in October 2008. The Forum reiterates its recommendation to the 2003 World Congress of Protected Areas. The Forum requests that the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples be duly considered in the deliberations and results of the World Congress on Protected Areas, and that its participating organizations address the issues of restitution and free, prior and informed consent of indigenous peoples for conservation activities affecting indigenous lands and territories, sacred sites and indigenous peoples’ conservation activities.
The Permanent Forum encourages indigenous parliamentarians to organize a global satellite conference of indigenous representatives with the objective of analyzing as a whole the level of progress in the promotion, protection and exercise of the rights of indigenous peoples around the world within the framework of the seventh session of the Permanent Forum.
The Permanent Forum invites members of all United Nations human rights treaty bodies, in particular the Committee on the Rights of the Child, to attend the annual sessions of the Permanent Forum, as observers, with the objective of increasing awareness about the distinct human rights and cultural contexts of indigenous peoples so as to enhance their work in relation to indigenous peoples and the Declaration.
The Permanent Forum notes that the Greenland-Danish Self-Government Commission submitted its report on self-government on 6 May 2008. The main task of the Commission has been to submit draft legislation regarding a self-government arrangement for Greenland. A referendum was held in Greenland on 25 November 2008 concerning the act and the process leading up to its entry into force. The Permanent Forum welcomes the successful passage of the act through the Danish Parliament on 19 May 2009.
The Permanent Forum supports an initiative to declare an International Year of Quinoa, recognizing the importance of quinoa to indigenous people and that it is a natural food with a high nutritional content.
Consistent with article 7 of the United Nations Declaration, the Permanent Forum recommends that the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights urgently establish an independent international commission to investigate the assassination of Berta Cáceres and Nelson Garcia of the Lenca people of Honduras.
The Permanent Forum welcomes the results of the 2018 High-level Expert Seminar on Indigenous Food Systems, in particular the creation of an online global hub on indigenous food systems, and would like to recommend that the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) continue work on: (a) Indigenous young people towards the creation of a forum on indigenous young people in the coming years; (b) Indigenous food systems, in particular in relation to the links with traditional knowledge, climate change and the respect of indigenous peoples’ rights to their lands, territories and resources; (c) Indigenous women (the global campaign on indigenous women and the leadership and food security schools for indigenous women).
Given the anniversary of such an important milestone for Member States and indigenous peoples, the Permanent Forum encourages those States that have not yet ratified or acceded to the Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention, 1989 (No. 169) to consider doing so.
Considering the continued threats facing indigenous peoples living in voluntary isolation and initial contact, and given their unique vulnerability in the time of the pandemic, the Permanent Forum recommends that local populations in the territories and adjacent areas of indigenous peoples living in voluntary isolation and initial contact be prioritized in COVID-19 vaccination plans. The Forum reminds States that, by virtue of their international obligations, and specifically those contained in the American Convention on Human Rights, they must adopt measures to safeguard the life and integrity of their citizens, especially when it comes to highly vulnerable population groups, as in the case of indigenous peoples living in voluntary isolation and initial contact.
The Permanent Forum welcomes the study of the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples on the right to education and the Expert Mechanism’s Advice No. 1. The Permanent Forum encourages States, indigenous peoples and others to disseminate these texts and incorporate them in national policies and practices.
The Permanent Forum was presented with horrific testimonies of Indigenous children incarcerated in prisons and other holding facilities. The Permanent Forum reminds Member States to fulfil their obligations under the Convention on the Rights of the Child in relation to the arrest, detention, or imprisonment of a child. No child should be in prison. In that regard, the Permanent Forum notes the finding in 2022 of the Supreme Court of Western Australia that the extensive solitary confinement and significant reduction in liberty of children, primarily Aboriginal children, was unlawful. The Permanent Forum calls upon Australia to respect the Court decision and remove its reservation to article 37 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The Permanent Forum recommends that Member States review and reform their child protection policies and systems to prevent undue removal of Indigenous children from their families and communities.