Search

Dr. Dawn Lavell-Harvard (Anishinaabe, Canada) explains how the concerns that have been labeled as “women’s issues” are in fact central to the progress of Indigenous rights. Often, concerns such as domestic abuse, schooling, and healthcare are often sidelined in favor of focusing on issues that are seen as more universal. Dr. Lavell-Harvard places them at the center of her activism efforts, showing that there is no need to compromise or postpone the rights of Indigenous women in Indigenous movements globally.

Producer: Avexnim Cojti

This program is dedicated to Joan Carling, an activist from the Kankanaey people of the Philippines. She has served as an Expert Member on the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues during 2014 and 2016, and as the Secretary General of the Asia Indigenous Pact. In this interview, she explains the benefits of the participation of Indigenous Peoples in local and global decision-making, which would bring a diversity of perspective and solutions to pressing issues.

Producer: Avexnim Cojti

Vicky Tauli-Corpuz (Igorot Kankanaey, Philippines), a long-time activist and UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, shares her experience with successes of small, local groups reaching out to the international community to collaborate in better defending their rights. She explains how her experience as a nurse led to community engagement, which quickly turned into a passion for advocating for the needs of community members as an activist.

Producer: Avexnim Cojti

Con el objetivo de contribuir al debate y discusión de los procesos estratégicos de comunicación de los pueblos y nacionalidades Indígenas del continente de Abya Yala, en función de sus luchas y caminos por la emancipación, despatriarcalización y descolonización, se llevó a cabo la Precumbre de Comunicación Indígena en Guatemala. ¿Cuantas personas asistieron y cuáles fueron los temas que se abordaron?

Antonio Gonzales has spent many years working with international forums for the rights of Indigenous Peoples. He has witnessed achievements but draws attention to the fact that indigenous communities across the world are struggling to bring their governments to the table for discussion. He is currently advocating for an International Convention.  

Antonio Gonzales explains how without proper enforcement governments, cooperations, and extractive industries willingly ignore frameworks like FPIC  which are designed to protect the rights of indigneous peoples. 

Ben Koissaba shares insight on how Indigenous peoples at the United Nations can better navigate the permanent froum and other UN spaces.

Bestang Dekdeken discusses the problems with FPIC as it is currently enforced in the Philippines, for example, how mining coorporations and extractive industries are able to find loopholes in FPIC in order to carry out their projects. 

Dev Kumar, from Nepal, explains why the radio is a powerful tool for Indigenous Peoples to have their voices be heard.

Julian Kunnie connects food soverignty to the spiritual and reflects on how disconected we are today from where our food comes from.

Julian Kunnie reflects on how our ways are destroying life for future generations and on the need to honor and protect mother nature instead of turning her into a commodity.

Vicky Tauli-Corpuz, UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, discusses with IRR Producer Shaldon Ferris the high rate of imprisonment of Australian Aboriginal individuals that she observed in her official visit to Australia. Disproportionate criminalization of Aboriginal people is evidence of systemic, structural inequality in Australia.

MUSIC

Song: "YAWLICHALLAY" by Luis Cisneros. Used with permission.

HIV advocate Marama Mullen (Ngatiawa Māori), Executive Director of INA, the Maori, Indigenous, and South Pacific HIV/AIDS Foundation, discusses the HIV/AIDS prevention and awareness network that her organization has fostered among Indigenous communities in the South Pacific.

MUSIC
Song: "Atahualpa" by Yarina. Used with permission.
Introduction: "Burn Your Village to the Ground" by A Tribe Called Red. Used with permission.

Vicky Tauli-Corpuz, UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, says she has found an inadequate process of consultation with Indigenous communities on the part of the national government during her visit to Honduras, where she was recently invited for a working visit to comment on a draft of a law regulating Free, Prior and Informed Consent. Indigenous Hondurans do not feel that they were adequately consulted on the content of the law. Further, the law does not meet widely accepted international standards of F.P.I.C.

In many Indigenous communities, dual justice systems operate in tandem: the European system, a colonial imposition characterized by hierarchical, punitive, written codicies, and the Indigenous system, which is often based in tradition and holistic in nature.

Human Rights Lawyer Michelle Cook (Dine') elaborates on the interactions between these two systems, and explains how communities can use the language of human rights to challenge the colonial legal system imposition in order to gain a seat at the table as independent nations with internationally recognized justice systems.

Indigenous Rights Radio Producer Avexnim Cojtí Ren investigates the movement to repatriate sacred objects, remains, and cultural patrimony taken without consent from Indigenous Peoples by governments, collectors, and individuals. Concepts of ownership, histories of oppression, methods of legal recourse, and recent examples of repatriation attempts all play an important role in the prospects for the return of heritage items to Indigenous Peoples.