The Permanent Forum welcomes and endorses general recommendation No. 39 (2022) on the rights of Indigenous women and girls of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women. Recommendation No. 39 provides critical guidance to States parties on legislative, policy and other relevant measures to ensure the implementation of their obligations under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, while taking into account the rights of Indigenous women and girls derived from specific instruments for the protection of Indigenous Peoples, such as the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and ILO Convention No. 169. The Permanent Forum calls upon Member States that have not yet done so to ratify without delay the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and ILO Convention No. 169.
The Permanent Forum recommends to ILO and its Governing Body that a technical expert meeting be organized to consider the drafting of a recommendation to supplement the Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention.
Furthermore, the Permanent Forum urges those States that have abstained to reverse their positions and endorse the Declaration so as to achieve full consensus.
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.