A Parallel Event – NGO CSW Forum
UN Commission on the Status of Women 66th Session
March 22, 2022 at 2:00 p.m. – 4:00 p.m. (Eastern)
Indigenous women will discuss how climate change may increase and fuel violence against them, and the strategies they are pursuing to restore safety in their communities. When unsustainable development takes and damages indigenous land and resources, whether through extraction, deforestation, environmental degradation, tourism, or otherwise, it not only contributes to global climate instability but also can adversely impact indigenous women and their communities by, for example, forcing their relocation; impairing their subsistence hunting, fishing, and gathering; and increasing their vulnerability to violence. Climate policies must address indigenous women’s needs and the enjoyment of their human rights.
Co-sponsoring Organizations
Organized in 2015, the Alaska Native Women’s Resource Center (AKNWRC) is a tribal nonprofit organization dedicated to ending violence against women with Alaska’s 229 tribes and allied organizations. AKNWRC board members are Alaska Native women raised in Alaska Native Villages and have 141 years of combined experience in tribal governments, nonprofit management, domestic violence and sexual assault advocacy (both individual crisis and systems and grassroots social change advocacy at the local, statewide, regional, national and international levels), and other social service experience. AKNWRC’s philosophy is that violence against women is rooted in the colonization of indigenous nations. (www.aknwrc.org)
Founded on April 19, 1989, the Coordination of the Indigenous Organizations of the Brazilian Amazon (COIAB) is the largest regional indigenous organization in Brazil, seeking to defend the rights of indigenous peoples to their land, environment, health, education, culture and self-determination. The organization also fights for the protection and recognition of indigenous peoples in voluntary isolation. The organization mobilizes roughly 160 distinct peoples, representing 440,000 individuals – nearly 60% of the country’s indigenous population – who collectively occupy approximately 110 million hectares of land across all 9 states of the Brazilian Amazon (Amazonas, Tocantins, Amapá, Maranhão, Rondônia, Acre, Pará, Roraima and Mato Grosso). However, these figures do not include indigenous peoples living in voluntary isolation. COIAB is a member of the Coordination of Indigenous Organizations of the Amazon Basin (COICA), one of the largest indigenous organizations in the world and of international representation, and is also a member of the Articulation of the Indigenous Peoples of Brazil (APIB), the largest indigenous organization in Brazil. (www.coiab.org.br)
Founded in 1978 by American Indians, the Indian Law Resource Center (ILRC) is a nonprofit organization that provides legal assistance to indigenous peoples of the Americas to combat racism and oppression, to protect their lands and environment, to protect their cultures, to achieve sustainable economic development and genuine self-government and to realize their other human rights. Its Safe Women, Strong Nation’s project works with indigenous women’s organizations and Native nations to end violence against indigenous women. ILRC is in consultative status with the UN Economic and Social Council. (www.indianlaw.org)
The International Mayan League (IML) is a nonprofit organization whose purpose is to promote, preserve and transmit the culture, history and contributions of our ancestors in the defense of Mother Earth. Its work is guided by the vision and practices of the spiritual and traditional leaders, elders and authorities to address the root causes contributing to discrimination, inequality and oppression of the Maya and the destruction of these communities and their environment. IML partners with allies from other indigenous nations, human rights organizations, academics, scholars, scientists and faith- based communities to stand in solidarity with the struggle of the Mayan peoples. Jointly IML addresses the many critical issues affecting not just the Maya but all of humanity and Mother Earth. (www.mayanleague.org)
The National Indigenous Women's Resource Center, Inc. (NIWRC) is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to ensure the safety of Native women by protecting and preserving the inherent sovereign authority of American Indian and Alaska Native nations to respond to domestic violence and sexual assault. NIWRC’s Board consists of Native women leaders from American Indian, Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian nations across the United States. NIWRC is a national resource center for Indian nations and Native organizations providing technical assistance, training, policy development, materials, resource information and the development of Native strategies and responses to end the violence. In 2015, NIWRC launched the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) Sovereignty Initiative to defend the constitutionality and functionality of all VAWA tribal provisions. (www.niwrc.org)
The Native Women’s Society of the Great Plains, Reclaiming Our Sacredness (NWSGP), is a coalition of domestic violence and/or sexual assault programs committed to the reclamation of the sacred status of women. The Society offers a vision that ends domestic and sexual violence against Native women, in all aspects – a vision of change. The Society works to support and strengthen sisterhood and local advocacy and program development efforts through culturally specific education, technical assistance training and resource implementation. The geographical area that constitutes the service area of the Society includes tribes in southern Minnesota, Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, South Dakota and Nebraska. (www.nativewomenssociety.com)
Pouhana ‘o Na Wahine [Enter Description Here]
