The Permanent Forum urges the international community to pay particular attention to the situation of the Batwa peoples, in particular Batwa women, and to support the inclusion of the San people and other indigenous groups in the national census. The Permanent Forum urges African States and their international development partners to review the poverty reduction strategy papers and other frameworks for integrating the specificities of such indigenous peoples as the Batwa, Pygmies, Touaregue, Amazigh, Khoisan and other hunter-gatherers or nomadic peoples in their countries, both in Central and in Southern Africa.
The Permanent Forum encourages APG to continue to defend in a cooperative and constructive manner, the principles of self-determination and free, prior and informed consent in accordance with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which the Plurinational State of Bolivia has incorporated into its domestic law and applied through its Constitution
The Permanent Forum calls upon the parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity to adopt the terminology “indigenous peoples and local communities” as an accurate reflection of the distinct identities developed by those entities since the adoption of the Convention almost 20 years ago.
In anticipation of the first session of the Human Rights Council, the Permanent Forum recommends that indigenous issues be a standing item in the agenda of the Human Rights Council and that due attention be paid to the human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous peoples. The role of the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous people should be maintained and further strengthened within the Human Rights Council.
The Permanent Forum commends OHCHR for conducting training sessions on the rights of indigenous peoples for its staff in a number of Asian and African countries. The Permanent Forum recommends that OHCHR continue to expand such training and capacity-building efforts for its staff, both at headquarters and in country teams in all regions.
The Forum recommends that Member States investigate the alarming rate of incarceration of indigenous women and communicate their findings to the Permanent Forum
The Permanent Forum urges States that have not yet done so to ratify the Convention of the Rights of Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families.