The Permanent Forum urges its secretariat, in cooperation with the secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity, to organize a side-event on the occasion of the fifth meeting of the Ad Hoc Open-ended Working Group on Access and Benefit-sharing of the Convention on Biological Diversity, as an occasion for the co-chairs of the Working Group, States parties and other interested groups to consider the conclusions and recommendations contained in the report of the international expert group meeting, held from 17 to 19 January 2007, on the Convention on Biological Diversity’s international regime on access and benefit-sharing and indigenous peoples’ human rights.
The Permanent Forum recommends that the Human Rights Council and the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights investigate the possibility of the development and acceptance of general recommendations relating to the right of indigenous peoples to self-determination by securing their access to their ancestral lands, territories and natural resources.
The Permanent Forum recommends that States take effective measures to halt land alienation in indigenous territories, for example, through a moratorium on the sale and registration of land, including the granting of land and other concessions in areas occupied by indigenous peoples, and also to assist indigenous communities, where appropriate, to register as legal entities.