OAS Secretary General José Miguel Insulza meets with Armstrong Wiggins and a delegation from the Haudenosaunee Confederacy
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Indigenous leaders from North and South America met with White House Counsel Gregory B. Craig and other State Department officials last month, praising President Obama's platform of change and expressing their hope that change will bring long overdue improvements in policy and attitudes towards indigenous peoples. Representatives from the Haudenosaunee (Six Nations) and the National Congress of the American Indian (NCAI) joined leaders from the Andean Indigenous Organization (CAOI), the National Indigenous Organization of Colombia (ONIC), the Confederation of Kichua People of Ecuador (ECUARUNARI) in asking for a renewed commitment to indigenous rights and the adoption of a strong American Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
Leaders held meetings with Craig and several other appointed and elected officials to discuss the United States' involvement in the promotion and protection of indigenous rights - not just in the U.S., but throughout the Americas - and asked for country's leadership in addressing this issue. The Indian leaders highlighted an alarming trend of human rights abuses against indigenous peoples across the Americas, and how these violations of their human rights are often related to efforts to confiscate and develop their natural resources. In a meeting with Representative Barney Frank and other members of the House Financial Services Committee, indigenous representatives from Peru, Ecuador, and Colombia spoke about how those governments work with extractive industries - backed and financed by international financial institutions or multilateral development banks - to invade indigenous lands and steal natural resources in violation of international human rights laws.
Further, they met with functionaries of the Organization of American States, including Secretary General Jose M. Insulza, to emphasize the important role of the OAS in developing, protecting, and promoting indigenous rights in the region. The OAS has been working on an American Declaration on Indigenous Rights since 1989, but negotiations over the text have slowed considerably in recent years. Though 143 countries expressed their support for indigenous rights through their adoption of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in 2007, three important countries of the Western Hemisphere failed to do so: the United States, Canada, and Colombia.
Miguel Palacin (CAOI) advocated for a new era of constructive collaboration between indigenous nations and state governments, and promised that thousands of indigenous people would come to Washington, D.C. to show support for an Obama Administration decision to sign the UN Declaration. Haudenosaunee chiefs and NCAI representative Diana Bob praised Obama's commitment to a government to government relationship with indigenous nations, and expressed their sincere desire to once again open the door to a long untended relationship between the original inhabitants of the Americas and the United States Government. As Haudenosaunee chief, Oren Lyons of the Onondaga Nation, unfolded the beaded wampum belt that records the original treaty between the United States and the Haudenosaunee, he reminded the White House staff of the United States' commitment to the Haudenosaunee People and the long interconnected history of the two nations. Running his fingers along twin streams of blue beads, he said "These lines represent our peoples, who were meant to walk side by side for as long as the sun shines, the water flows down hill, and the grass grows green."