ONU apresentou hoje um relatório inédito "State of the World's Indigenous Peoples"

Foi hoje divulgado, na sede das Nações Unidas em Nova Iorque, o 1º relatório mundial alguma vez elaborado sobre a realidade actual dos diversos povos indígenas.
O documento – "State of the World's Indigenous Peoples" – foi apresentado por Myrna Cunningham, uma das autoras do trabalho, e Vicki Tauli-Corpuz, 'chairperson' do UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues.

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• Foreword by Mr. Sha Zukang Under-Secretary General for Economic and Social Affairs
• Introduction by the Secretariat of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues
• Chapter I: Poverty and Well Being by Joji Carino
• Chapter II: Culture by Naomi Kipuri
• Chapter III: Environment by Neva Collings
• Chapter IV: Contemporary Education by Duane Champagne
• Chapter V: Health by Myrna Cunningham
• Chapter VI: Human Rights by Dalee Sambo Dorough
• Chapter VII: Emerging Issues by Mililani Trask

Fica o texto introdutório disponibilizado pela ONU:

Indigenous peoples contribute extensibly to humanity's cultural diversity, enriching it withmore than two thirds of its languages and an extrordinary amount of its traditional knowledge.
There are over 370 million indigenous people in some 90 countries, living in all regions of the world. The situation of indigenous peoples in many parts of the world is critical today. Poverty rates are significantly higher among indigenous peoples compared to other groups. While they constitute 5 per cent of the world's population, they are 15 per cent of the world's poor. Most indicators of well-being show that indigenous peoples suffer disproportinately compared to non-indigenous peoples. Indigenous peoples face systemic discrimination and exclusion from political and economic power; they continue to be over-represented among the poorest, the illiterate, the destitute; they are displaced by wars and environmental disasters; indigenous peoples are dispossessed of their ancestral lands and deprived of their resources for survival, both physical and cultural; they are even robbed of their very right to life.
In more modern versions of market exploitation, indigenous peoples see their traditional knowledge and cultural expressions marketed and patented without their consent or participation.

Of the some 7,000 languages today, it is estimated that more than 4,000 are spoken by indigenous peoples. Language specialists predict that up to 90 per cent of the world’s languages are likely to become extinct or threatened with extinction by the end of the century.

Although the state of the world's indigenous peoples is alarming, there is some cause for optimism. The international community increasingly recognizes indigenous peoples' human rights, most prominently evidenced by the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Indigenous peoples themselves continue to organize for the promotion of their rights. They are the stewards of some of the world's most biologically diverse areas and their traditional knowledge about the biodibversity of these areas is invaluable. As the effects of climate change are becoming clearer, it is increaslingly evident that indigenous peoples must play a central role in developing adaptation and mitigation efforts to this global challenge.

The State of the World's Indigenous Peoples is the result of a collaborative effort, organized by the Secretariat of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. The Chapters were written by independent experts.

• In the United States, a Native American is 600 times more likely to contract tuberculosis and 62 per cent more likely to commit suicide than the general population.
• In Australia, an indigenous child can expect to die 20 years earlier than his non-native compatriot. The life expectancy gap is also 20 years in Nepal, while in Guatemala it is 13 years and in New Zealand it is 11.
• In parts of Ecuador, indigenous people have 30 times greater risk of throat cancer than the national average.
• Worldwide, more than 50 per cent of indigenous adults suffer from Type 2 diabetes – a number predicted to rise.

“Every day, indigenous communities all over the world face issues of violence and brutality, continuing assimilation policies, dispossession of land, marginalization, forced removal or relocation, denial of land rights, impacts of large-scale development, abuses by military forces and a host of other abuses,” the report’s authors said in a news release.
Although indigenous peoples make up only 5 per cent of the global population, they constitute around one third of the world’s 900 million extremely poor rural people. In both developed and developing countries, poor nutrition, limited access to care, lack of resources crucial to maintaining health and well-being and contamination of natural resources are all contributing factors to the terrible state of indigenous health worldwide.
At the report’s launch at UN Headquarters in New York, UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues Chairperson Vicki Tauli-Corpuz said its value would be far-reaching because it comprises for the first time very clearly aggregated data.
“We believe this is going to be crucial for Governments and for the UN to address more seriously and comprehensively the issues of indigenous people,” she told a news briefing. “It’s very daring and bold in a sense because it does identify countries and the situation of indigenous peoples in various countries both in the developed world as well as in the developing world.”
Indigenous peoples experience disproportionately high levels of maternal and infant mortality, malnutrition, cardiovascular illnesses, HIV/AIDS and other infectious diseases such as malaria and tuberculosis (TB), while suicide rates, particularly among youth, are considerably higher in many countries, for example up to 11 times the national average for the Inuit in Canada. The Inuit TB rate is over 150 times higher.
The study repeatedly identifies displacement from lands, territories and resources as one of the most significant threats for indigenous peoples, citing many examples, including in Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Hawaii, Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Colombia.
“When indigenous peoples have reacted and tried to assert their rights, they have suffered physical abuse, imprisonment, torture and even death,” it says, stressing that their rights to their own lands and territories must be respected while they need to develop their own definitions and indicators of poverty and well-being.
“Indigenous peoples suffer from the consequences of historic injustice, including colonization, dispossession of their lands, territories and resources, oppression and discrimination, as well as lack of control over their own ways of life. Their right to development has been largely denied by colonial and modern States in the pursuit of economic growth,” it adds, warning that the importance of land and territories to indigenous cultural identity cannot be stressed enough.
Of the world’s 6,000 to 7,000 languages, a great majority are spoken by indigenous peoples, and many, if not most, are in danger of becoming extinct, with some 90 per cent possibly doomed within the next 100 years. About 97 per cent of the world’s population currently speaks 4 per cent of its languages, while only 3 per cent speaks 96 per cent of them.
Indigenous peoples, who are the stewards of some of the most biologically diverse areas, accumulating an immeasurable amount of traditional knowledge about their ecosystems, also face the dual and somewhat contradictory threats of discrimination and commodification.
They face racism and discrimination that sees them as inferior, yet they are increasingly recognized for their unique relationship with their environment, their traditional knowledge and their spirituality, leading to external efforts to profit from their culture which are frequently out of their control, providing them no benefits, and often a great deal of harm.

via UN News Centre


Cf. Press Briefings:

• Press Conference by Indigenous Peoples’ Forum
• Press Conference on World Bank Study on Indigenous People
• Press Conference on Ninth Session of Indigenous Forum

Cf. Press Releases:

• General Assembly Will Hold ‘World Conference on Indigenous Peoples’ in 2014, under Terms of Resolution Recommended by Third Committee
• Implementation of Indigenous Rights Declaration Should Be Regarded as Political, Moral, Legal Imperative without Qualification, Third Committee Told
• At Headquarters, Secretary-General Praises Indigenous Filmmakers for Enriching World’s Understanding of ‘What Binds Us Together as a Human Family’