The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of the Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) was an effort consolidated by the General Assembly that was adopted as an international human rights instrument with forty-six articles to provide autonomy for the indigenous peoples to create and manage their own affairs in areas such as healthcare, education, and administration while providing support to protect indigenous lands, cultures, languages, and traditions.
History
- 1982 –ECOSOC established the Working Group on Indigenous Populations with the mandate to develop a develop a set of minimum standards that would protect indigenous peoples + their rights
- “The Working Group was established as result of a study by José R. Martinez Cobo on the problem of discrimination faced by indigenous peoples throughout the world. The study outlined the oppression, marginalization and exploitation suffered by indigenous peoples.”
- 1994 – “The Working Group submitted a first draft declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples to the Sub-Commission on the Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities, which was later approved”
- “The Draft was sent for consideration to the then U.N. Commission on Human Rights for further discussion and if it was deemed to be appropriate, to approve the proposed declaration before its submission to ECOSOC and the U.N. General Assembly.”
- 1995 – An open-ended inter-sessional working group was created to consider the findings of the
- 1994 draft declaration and elaborate further on the considerations and protections of the people.
- 1995-2005 – the instrument was not adopted by the General Assembly during the International Decade of the World’s Indigenous People (1995-2004)
- 2005 – a mandate was extended for the working group on indigenous populations by U.N. Commission on Human Rights into the Second International Decade of the World’s Indigenous Peoples (2005-2015)
- 2006 – Revisions to the human rights machinery within the United Nations resulted in the replacement of the U.N. Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR) with the U.N. Human Rights Council (UNHRC)
- June 29 – the UNHRC adopted the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
- December 28 – The 3rd Committee of the GA adopted a draft resolution on the deference of the UNDRIP whose main sponsor was Peru with numerous European and Latin American country co-sponsors, but an initiative led by Namibia co-sponsored by numerous African countries pushed for the ratification of the UNDRIP
- 13 September 2007 – the UNDRIP was voted into existence with 144 countries in favor, 4 against (United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand), and 11 abstentions
- (Since the adoption of the Declaration, the 4 nations who voted against the ratification reversed their vote and begun their support in favor of the doctrine)
Modern day
The American States’ Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
- The Organization of American States (OAS) of the 35 independent states in the Western Hemisphere adopted the American Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples which the Native American Rights Fund (NARF) represented the National Congress of American Indians in this program, including indigenous representatives from across the hemisphere, since 1999. This declaration contains 41 articles ranging from rights of self-determination, education, health, self-government, culture, lands, territories and natural resources. Within the doctrine it includes equipment that address the particular situations of indigenous peoples in the Americas–including protections for those living in voluntary isolation and those affected by a state’s internal armed conflict in North America, Mexico, Central America, South America, and the Caribbean.
UNDRIP Has Changed Canada’s Relationship with Indigenous Peoples
American Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. https://www.narf.org/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/2016oas-declaration-indigenous-people.pdf.
“The American Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.” The American Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples | Indian Law Resource Center, https://indianlaw.org/adrip/home.
“American States’ Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.” Native American Rights Fund, 25 Sept. 2019, https://www.narf.org/cases/oas-indigenous-rights/.
Declaration on the Rights of Ethnic Minorities – OAS. https://www.oas.org/dil/1992%20Declaration%20on%20the%20Rights%20of%20Persons%20Belonging%20to%20National%20or%20Ethnic,%20Religious%20and%20Linguistic.pdf.
“Indigenous Peoples.” U.S. Agency for International Development, 1 Apr. 2020, https://www.usaid.gov/environmental-policy-roadmap/indigenous-peoples#:~:text=Adopted%20in%202007%2C%20the%20UNDRIP,specific%20situation%20of%20indigenous%20peoples.
United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. https://www.un.org/development/desa/indigenouspeoples/wp-content/uploads/sites/19/2019/01/UNDRIP_E_web.pdf.