CONSEJO INTERNACIONAL DE TRATADOS INDIOS

United Nations Commission on Human Rights

6TH Ad Hoc Intersessional Working Group on the Draft Declaration for the Rights of Indigenous Peoples

November 20 – December 1, 2000

Methodology of the Working Group

Statement by the International Indian Treaty Council

Thank you Mr. Chairman.  Respectful greetings to state and Indigenous delegations. 

The International Indian Treaty Council and its affiliated organizations participating in this session, Defensoria Maya and Comite Campesina del Altiplano of Guatemala, Movimiento de la Juventud Kuna of Panama, and Federacion Indigena y Campesina de Imbabura of Ecuador,            welcome and express our support for the statements presented by other Indigenous delegations regarding the implementation of the fundamental principle of full and equal participation by Indigenous Peoples in this Intersessional Working Group.  We are confident that such equality of participation is essential for the legitimacy of the Declaration which will eventually be approved by this process.

We also express our appreciation for those state delegations which have been outspoken on this principle, and have maintained their commitment to the full participation of Indigenous Peoples in this process, despite the challenges and at times frustrations that it poses for all of us.  We believe that the trust we are building and obstacles we are overcoming by working together in this way represents an essential and historic contribution to the strengthening of the new relationships and new partnerships called for by the General Assembly Declaration for the International Decade of the World’s Indigenous Peoples.

Recognizing that the goal of these sessions is to reach consensus on approval of a Declaration for the Rights of Indigenous Peoples for eventual adoption by the UN General Assembly, our delegation wishes to make a comment regarding the pattern, over the past two years, of states entering into closed sessions during our working time together, without the participation of Indigenous Peoples, to draft new text.   We believe that this methodology is contradictory to the principle and practice of full and equal participation.  It has, in fact, resulted in taking us further away from the possibility of consensus which does not only include state delegations but Indigenous delegations as well.

When these composite texts are generated by states behind closed doors outside of the transparency of general debate, and then inserted into the final reports as annexes, Indigenous delegates are not accorded the opportunity to hear the specific objections or difficulties of individual state delegations with the current text.  We are therefore denied the opportunity to discuss these problems openly with states, and to respond with clarifications or explanations which might resolve these problems. 

This method is in fact the opposite of consensus building, and violates the principles of transparency, open dialogue and full participation upon which the ultimate success of this process will necessarily be based.   If dialogue in smaller groups is deemed desirable by this body, we suggest that regional discussion groups or discussion groups focussing on a certain article or groups of articles might be fruitful, if they include both state and Indigenous delegations as full participants.  

Mr. Chairman, we request your consideration of such alternate methods of work which will keep state and Indigenous delegations together,  encourage dialogue and transparency, and move us towards rather than farther away from consensus.  Thank you.