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Sunday, November 15, 2026
News and Views from the Global South
Indigenous Rights
CIVIL SOCIETY: In Defence of the Defenders
New defence is being considered for defenders of civil society rights by the nearly 1,000 participants in the Civicus world assembly under way in Glasgow this week.BRAZIL: Indigenous Resistance Movement Defends Traditional Beliefs
Twenty indigenous people have been occupying the abandoned building of the Museu do Indio in Rio de Janeiro since October, to call attention to "500 years of resistance to genocide," a view of their history that has acquired new relevance in the light of the Vatican's latest position on Christian evangelisation during the colonial era.CLIMATE CHANGE: “We’ve Never Seen What We’re Seeing Now”
One night about four years ago, Lakhan Bibi's grandfather told her that things in their land were going to change. "How come?" she asked. "Look up to the sky," he said. "You see the moon? It is no longer where it used to be."LATIN AMERICA: Second Chance for Indigenous People After ‘Lost Decade’
Tensions between indigenous people, governments and transnational corporations will grow in the second International Decade of the World's Indigenous People, which began in 2005, say experts.
ENVIRONMENT: Ecuador Seeks Aid Not to Exploit Amazon Oil
A novel proposal by Ecuador is testing world leaders' commitment to fight global warming and preserve the biodiversity of the Earth.INDIA: Dalit Woman Stages a Political Revolution
The Hindi word 'Dalit' has entered the international lexicon in recent years as an evocative reminder of the unique cruelty and injustice of India's caste system.CHILE: Pressing Hard for Full Recognition of Indigenous Rights
In the next few days, President Michelle Bachelet will throw all her political weight behind the motion for Congress to finally ratify the ILO convention recognising the collective and individual rights of indigenous people.BIODIVERSITY-INDIA: Climate Change Skews Tribal Farming
A group of 25 leaders of the Soliga tribe in the isolated Biligiri Rangaswamy Temple Wildlife Sanctuary in the hills of this southern Indian state sit in a semi-circle, discussing matters of concern to them.SRI LANKA: 'Flying Tiger' Raids Pose Hard Questions
By successfully carrying out air raids on military and economic targets in and around the capital, separatist rebels have demonstrated a new capacity to wage ‘all-out' war in their fight to carve out a separate state for the Tamil ethnic minority in Sri Lanka.
EDUCATION-BOLIVIA: Literacy Drive on Full Steam
Coipasa is ahead, with Chipaya on its heels. Right behind them are Urubichá and Guarayos. The competitors are not race horses but rural villages and towns in Bolivia racing to declare themselves free of illiteracy.GUATEMALA: Indigenous Women Last in Line for MDGs
Guatemala is making slow, uneven progress towards meeting the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), with maternal mortality and illiteracy remaining the most persistent problems, mid-way to the 2015 deadline.
PERU: Blood and Gold on Algamarca Hill
While two companies are disputing a hill rich in gold in the extreme northwest of Peru, more than 3,000 informal sector miners are working there without the most basic safety or environmental protection measures.BIODIVERSITY-INDIA: Lax Laws Worry Villagers, Activists
Five years after India enacted a seemingly pioneering, conservation-oriented law to preserve the country’s amazing diversity of flora and fauna, the Act remains bogged down by widespread protests from local communities, while civic groups protest the dilution of related environmental laws.DEVELOPMENT: Global Campaign Calls for Tackling the Roots of Poverty
The Global Call to Action against Poverty (GCAP) made a commitment in Uruguay Saturday to extend their campaign until 2015, and to emphasise the structural causes that determine that over one billion people in the world are living in extreme poverty.
PERU: Farmers, Informal Gold Miners Clash Over Pollution
There is a cemetery at the foot of this hill full of gold and silver near the village of Algamarca in northwestern Peru - an indication of the risks involved in informal mining, which uses highly toxic substances like cyanide and mercury.ENVIRONMENT: Oxy Faces Lawsuit Threat Over Amazon Toxins
Indigenous communities in the Peruvian Amazon are warning the U.S. oil giant Occidental Petroleum (Oxy) that it could soon face a lawsuit in the United States if it fails to clean up toxic waste in their tropical rainforest.VENEZUELA: The Gift of Native Tongues, On the Air
Eiker García and Nelson Maldonado took a deep breath, then exhaled slowly, producing a long "mmm" sound, following the instructions of the professional radio presenter who was giving them breathing and elocution lessons.
Q&A: Victims in Colombia Are Gagged, the Public Misinformed
When a murder occurs in a Colombian community, the locals know who committed it: far-right paramilitaries, leftwing guerrillas, or the security forces. They also know if fighting really took place, or if the "enemy" bodies displayed on television as "trophies" by army officers were in fact dead civilians.
DEVELOPMENT-GUATEMALA: Fair Trade Begins to Bear Fruit
The living and working conditions of thousands of small farmers in Guatemala have seen much improvement since they joined the "fair trade" system, which sets new rules for the game in an otherwise difficult global market.CLIMATE CHANGE: Leaders Sound the Alarm on Island Peoples, Economies
The effects of global warming could devastate local economies and force the migration of tens of thousands of people, warn the leaders of small island nations as they fight to put the issue in the global spotlight.MEXICO: Alleged Rape of Indigenous Woman a Minefield of Contradictions
Opposition lawmakers in Mexico refused to review evidence presented by the National Human Rights Commission (CNDH) that contradicts charges against the army for the alleged gang rape by soldiers of a 73-year-old indigenous woman, who died on Feb. 25.« Previous Page — Next Page »
The planet's roughly 350 million indigenous peoples took notable steps on the international stage in the last decade. They got the world's governments to agree to create a body to represent them at the United Nations, the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, and to appoint a special rapporteur responsible for their human rights. In 2007 a Universal Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples was approved by the UN. Yet the living conditions of most "tribal", "aboriginal", "native" or "first" peoples remain precarious. IPS, with its network of contributors at the UN and linked to indigenous communities worldwide, is committed to tracking the world community's efforts to do justice to the rights and aspirations of these peoples, with a special current focus on Latin America's 40 million rural indigenous peoples.
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