Indigenous Rights

Foreign Farmers Undermine Food Security in Zambia

By Nebert Mulenga
Increased agricultural development in Zambia will actually compromise the country’s food security as peasant farmers continue to be driven off their customary land to pave the way for large-scale local and foreign agribusiness, according to the University of Zambia’s dean of the school of agriculture, Dr. Mickey Mwala.

Tribal Wars Threaten South Sudan Again

By Jared Ferrie
The huge Russian-made helicopter descended slowly towards conical mud huts clustered together and surrounded by endless grassland, lush and green with the season’s rains here in the South Sudanese village of Yuai.

Symbol of Native Culture to Be Bulldozed for World Cup

By Fabiana Frayssinet
One victim of the remodelling of Brazil’s Maracaná football stadium in preparation for the World Cup is the old Museum of the Indian, where people from different indigenous groups have attempted to keep their culture alive in the heart of Rio de Janeiro.

Injured Struggle in the Sahara

By Rebecca Murray
Safia’s six-year-old body is riddled with scars from the rocket that hit her home in February. With her immediate family all killed in the violent attack, this sole survivor smiles shyly as she visits the medics that fought to save her life.

Communal Land Titling at a Standstill in Peru

By Milagros Salazar
The titling of the lands of indigenous and peasant communities has been at a practical standstill for two years, with many of the corresponding files lost or incomplete. But the promotion of foreign investment is moving full steam ahead in the same regions.
Indigenous women in rural Peru have to walk longer and longer distances to find firewood. Credit: Elena Villanueva/IPS

Rural Women in Peru Cope “Where Life Is Very Sad”

By Mariela Jara
When the crops in her rural highlands community in southern Peru were covered with a thick layer of ice one night, Felícitas Quispe, 43, organised her neighbours to make an effort to keep people from starving to death.

Tribal War Simmers in Libya’s Desert

By Walter García and Rebecca Murray
A group of Tabu fighters with mud-splattered trucks rest on the outskirts of Zweila, a small historic slave-trade stop in Libya’s southwest Sahara.

Garifuna Women, Custodians of Culture and the Environment in Honduras

By Thelma Mejía
Hurricane Mitch, which devastated Honduras 14 years ago, prompted a group of Garifuna women to start organising, to help the people in greatest need of assistance.

Guatemala under Pressure to Investigate Shooting of Native Protesters

By Danilo Valladares
The deaths of eight indigenous demonstrators taking part in a protest against the Guatemalan government in the southwestern province of Totonicapán have provoked outrage within the country and abroad. The protesters accuse the army of shooting into the crowd.

Funds Crunch Skews Aichi Targets on Biodiversity

By Keya Acharya
The United Nations 11th Conference of the Parties  to the Convention on Biological Biodiversity (COP 11 CBD), underway in this southern Indian city, is lost on where to garner the billions of dollars needed to implement the ‘Aichi targets,’ due to be met by 2020.

Army’s Former Sex Slaves Testify in Guatemala

By Danilo Valladares
"In the garrison they had rooms where they would rape us; sometimes there were three, four or five soldiers,” Rosa Pérez*, one of the women used by the Guatemalan army as a sex slave during this country’s civil war, testified in court.

Major Extractives Firms No Longer Ignoring Community Consent

By Carey L. Biron
New research from Oxfam, an international aid agency, finds that some of the largest multinational oil and mining companies are increasingly incorporating principles of community consent into their day-to-day operations.
Jorge Medina practices integrated, diversified farming on land near Havana. Credit: Ivet González /IPS

Starving for an Equitable Food System

By Lindsey Walker
The root cause of hunger and malnutrition for millions of people worldwide lies in the severely skewed and unfairly structured hierarchy of policymakers, not in natural disasters or food shortages, according to the Right to Food and Nutrition Watch 2012 (RTFN Watch) released Tuesday.

U.N. Report Chastises U.S. for Status of Native Population

By Carey L. Biron
A top United Nations official has presented the first ever international investigation into the situation of indigenous peoples in the United States, urging the adoption of new policies and mechanisms to “address persistent deep-seeded problems related to historical wrongs, failed policies of the past and continuing systemic barriers”.

India Coaxes Tribal Girls Into Schools

By Manipadma Jena
The deafening din of the lunch gong is sweet music to the 200-odd tribal girls rushing down the stairway, clutching stainless steel plates and tumblers.

Ecotourism Helps Amazon Jungle Communities Survive

By Rafael Acuña Coaquira
The Tsimane Mosetene people in Bolivia’s Amazon jungle region have found a tool to preserve their habitat and way of life: a community ecotourism project that won a United Nations-sponsored international award.

Kenya’s Water Wars Kill Scores

By Protus Onyango
Water scarcity is fuelling deadly inter-ethnic wars that continue to claim lives in Kenya, according to government officials. And if nothing is done to educate communities on how to conserve the valuable resource, the situation will escalate, governance experts and environmentalists warn.

Indigenous Consultations in Peru to Debut in Amazon Oil Region

By Milagros Salazar
Peru will debut a new mechanism for prior consultation with indigenous peoples by seeking their approval for a new stage of oil drilling operations in the infamous Lot 1AB in the northeastern Amazon region of Loreto.

Declaration of War in Mato Grosso do Sul

By Alice Marcondes
The land conflict between the Guaraní-Kaiowá indigenous people and large landowners in the southwestern Brazilian state of Mato Grosso do Sul is a powder keg ready to explode, say observers.

Mystery Surrounds Reported Massacre of Yanomami Village

By Humberto Márquez
Up to 80 Yanomami men, women and children in a remote community in the Amazon jungle in southern Venezuela were reportedly killed in early July by wildcat gold miners from Brazil, according to indigenous organisations.

Pacific Nations Women Promised a Better Deal

By Catherine Wilson
Leaders of 15 Pacific Island nations have pledged to remove barriers to women’s economic empowerment, end violence against women and pave the way for their increased political representation, at the conclusion of the 43rd Pacific Islands Forum in Rarotonga in the Cook Islands, last week. The meeting was also attended by the Executive Director of UN Women, Michelle Bachelet.
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