The Permanent Forum recommends that relevant United Nations agencies dealing with indigenous peoples’ issues should take action on the inclusion of indigenous persons with disabilities in all their activities, make their websites accessible to persons with disabilities, promote the increased participation of indigenous persons with disabilities in their annual sessions and consider having expert sessions on indigenous persons with disabilities.
Recalling the recommendations made by the Special Rapporteur appointed to undertake a study on the status of implementation of the Chittagong Hill Tracts Accord of 1997 (E/C.19/2011/6, sect. VIII), and given that the situation of the indigenous peoples of the Chittagong Hill Tracts remains a matter of concern, the Forum encourages the Government of Bangladesh to allocate sufficient human and financial resources and set a time frame for the full implementation of the Accord.
The Permanent Forum recommends to the Human Rights Council that, in the course of a universal periodic review, the situation of indigenous peoples of a country under consideration also be examined.
The Permanent Forum is convinced that a declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples will be an instrument of great value through which to advance the rights and aspirations of the world’s indigenous peoples. The Permanent Forum therefore recommends the adoption without amendments of the draft declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples as contained in the proposals of the Chairperson of the working group of the Commission on Human Rights on the draft United Nations declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples (see E/CN.4/2006/79, annex I) by the General Assembly during its sixty-first session in 2006. This would represent a major achievement for the Second International Decade of the World’s Indigenous People.
The Permanent Forum recommends that human rights treaty bodies begin to undertake dialogue and cooperation with indigenous peoples’ organizations with a view to discussing the preparation of general comments relevant to indigenous peoples, and that those bodies be encouraged to formulate recommendations and general comments within their competence on the rights of indigenous peoples.
The Permanent Forum recommends that United Nations human rights mechanisms examine the plight of indigenous peoples from French Polynesia, Guam and the Marshall Islands who have been victims of the effects of nuclear testing in the Pacific.
The Permanent Forum recommends that the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination elaborate a general comment on discrimination in housing, taking into account the situation of indigenous peoples.
The Permanent Forum supports the work of the Committee on the Rights of the Child in its current effort to draft a general comment on the status of indigenous children worldwide, supports the Committee’s effort to secure broad input from indigenous peoples and encourages wide dissemination of the final report to indigenous peoples, States and United Nations bodies and agencies.
United Nations special procedures are an essential tool for monitoring the implementation of priority human rights issues. The Permanent Forum recommends that the special procedures with a mandate on gender issues (carried out by the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, and the Special Rapporteur on trafficking in persons, especially in women and children) brief the Permanent Forum each year during its annual session on the situation of indigenous women.
The Forum recommends that Member States, United Nations bodies and mechanisms, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and other parts of the United Nations system strengthen the machinery to address the urgent, gross and ongoing human rights violations, militarization of indigenous lands and systemic violence committed by Member States against indigenous peoples.
The Forum expresses its appreciation to the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, and the Special Rapporteur on the human rights and fundamental freedoms of indigenous peoples for their participation at its third session, and recommends that they pay special attention to the factors contributing to violence against indigenous women, especially domestic violence and sexual abuse.
The Permanent Forum recommends that the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in cooperation with the Permanent Forum develop a coherent and strategic plan of action in Africa in cooperation with indigenous peoples and their representative organizations, and that the implementation of the programme of the Office of the High Commissioner to strengthen capacity to protect and advocate for the human rights of indigenous peoples be linked to other United Nations bodies, notably the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity, the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), UNESCO and others.