Today is Human Rights Day! Let us remember that Indigenous Peoples' Rights are also Human Rights!

On December 10, 1948, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), the first global enunciation of human rights and one of the first major achievements of the new United Nations.

As we celebrate the 74th International Human Rights Day, we recognize that Indigenous Peoples' resiliency and dignity continue to persevere, despite ongoing assimilation, genocide, violent attempts to dismantle Indigenous lifeways, and the theft and destruction of Indigenous lands.

At Cultural Survival, we make it a priority to track and denounce violence towards Indigenous human rights and environmental defenders. So far this year, we have documented 39 murders (not exhaustive) of Indigenous human rights and environmental defenders in Latin American countries where we work. We continue to investigate and denounce these cases. 

In 2022, we submitted 7 reports to UN human rights monitoring mechanisms holding governments accountable for Indigenous Peoples' rights violations in Guatemala, South Africa, India, Japan, and Brazil. We continue to support human rights education through our grant programs, ensuring that Indigenous communities are aware of international human rights frameworks.

As part of our efforts, from June to September 2022, we hosted a series of online workshops for Indigenous women frontline defenders in the Amazon Basin in which they built their technical capacities to continue defending their rights and land through radio, photography, and social media, while also forming a network of strong and resilient Indigenous women. The 13 virtual sessions targeted Indigenous women defenders of life and land from Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, and Brazil.

We also continue supporting our partners in the implementation of the 2021 Inter-American Court of Human Rights freedom of expression decision which deemed Guatemala “internationally responsible for the violation of the rights to freedom of expression, equality before the law and participation in cultural life” of Indigenous Peoples. 

Despite our efforts, the number of attacks against Indigenous journalists and Indigenous human rights and land defenders is steadily rising, now with a new frontier of extractivism related to mining for transition minerals such as lithum, cobalt, copper, manganese, nickel, and zinc.

For 50 years, we have committed to supporting Indigenous communities to assert and exercise their rights. Every day at Cultural Survival, we work to make these rights a reality, through Indigenous-led grant-making, advocacy, communications, and capacity building by supporting grassroots Indigenous solutions, uplifting Indigenous women's and youth leadership, and amplifying Indigenous voices about international human rights. 

In observance of Human Rights Day and in honor of the Indigenous communities we work with, we invite you to join us as we collectively advance Indigenous rights worldwide. If you haven’t yet, we call on you, our community, to help us reach our end-of-year goal!  Join us in the fight to advance and defend human rights and support Indigenous human rights and land defenders by making a generous gift to Cultural Survival today! 

Listen and share our Indigenous Rights Radio Series on Navigating the United Nations for Indigenous Peoples. 

This series, broken down into ten 2-minute programs, takes listeners step by step through the uses of the various tools that the UN provides to Indigenous Peoples to defend and advocate for their rights, including the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, the UN Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and the UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

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