Panel 3
Transcript is about the English parts of the panel:
Oliver Loode: Honourable President Rüütel and Mrs Ingrid Rüütel, ladies and gentlemen. I am very happy that on Human Rights Day today, we have the opportunity to talk and think about the rights of the indigenous peoples of the world – and we are doing so with distinguished representatives of indigenous peoples from three continents: Europe, Asia and North America. For this, I would like to thank the organisers, the Institute of Human Rights. I would also like to thank the previous speakers for their very interesting introductions. The discussion on the rights of indigenous peoples is very topical this year, here in Estonia. We have already heard about the World Conference on Indigenous Peoples that was held in September, which is probably the most important event that has been held this decade for indigenous peoples. It is important to note that President Toomas Hendrik Ilves gave a speech at the opening plenary session of this conference, which already affirmed that Estonia has a good reputation and Estonia is taken seriously by the world’s indigenous peoples. Now, two and a half months after this conference, it is a good time to reflect on what happened during the conference, whether there has been any interim progress and what are the hopes for future achievements stemming from this conference. The rights of indigenous peoples is also a very timely topic for the reason that this year, there were many important events among the indigenous peoples whose fate should matter to us as Estonians.
There was already mention of the Izhorian question and the Izhorians, on whose traditional lands there are plans to build a carbomite factory, which threatens their way of life and environment – and the environment of the Baltic Sea region more broadly. This is quite a fresh topic and perhaps to be more precise about what the Foreign Minister said, I do not think that the Izhorians’ situation is bleak at all. I was there in July and I saw clear evidence that Izhorian civil society is very active, and I am pleased that a representative of the Izhorian people is here today among our panellists.
I am also definitely talking about the Crimean Tatars. I greatly appreciate the Estonian state and its leaders for starting to consider Crimean Tatars as a priority indigenous people for us. Whereas unlike with the Finno-Ugric peoples, we are not related to the Crimean Tatars through language, there is much in the recent history of our peoples that is common and binds us. We should recall that this year marks 70 years since the mass deportation of Crimean Tatars by the Stalinist Soviet regime, which resulted in the deaths of more than 100,000 Crimean Tatars. For this reason we can consider them to be closely related to us through history or memory. That means that we should not be indifferent about their future. I applaud the Foreign Minister for affirming or promising to deal with the Crimean Tatar issue in future.
While the rest of our discussion, due to the composition of our panel, will be in the English and Russian languages, then I stress that it will be in the Estonian spirit in every way.
Excellences, ladies and gentlemen. The topic of this panel is “Human rights of indigenous peoples, theory and practice.” The key issue for the overwhelming majority of the indigenous peoples of this world is that this global theory about the rights of indigenous peoples often differs from the local and practical realities. In theory there is a global consensus about the minimum standards of the rights of indigenous peoples, as manifested in, above all, the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples that has by now been endorsed by 150 states and objected to by no country. However, we see that in practice only very few if any states with indigenous populations fully follow the principles of this declaration. The implementation of this declaration has been quite uneven. While there is one state, Bolivia, that has codified the UN Declaration into national law, for many other states, the UN Declaration seems to be more a recommendation or to have even an aspirational character. In practice, there are very many interpretations and levels of implementation of the UN Declaration, probably as many as there are states. More often than not, implementation lags behind the rhetoric of these states. As a result, the daily, local realities faced by indigenous rights activists on whatever continent, in both the so-called developing and developed world, differ greatly from these sophisticated and polished speeches that one hears in the halls of the United Nations. These local realities can be very grim and gritty, as in many countries indigenous activities who confront quite powerful economic and political interests, are criminalised, they are subjected to violence. I’m not sure if we here in this hall really understand the difficulties that indigenous activists and peoples in general face, and that includes most of us who have not taken that path.
Many indigenous peoples face racism, discrimination, negative stereotyping and its not always the fault of the state as such, it often reflects underlying attitudes in the population that have long-standing historical reasons. So many of these indigenous peoples have nowhere to go, nobody to call for help. Because their own states often collude with corporations who for example are interested in exploiting their natural resources. And international mechanisms, including the UN, are not really equipped to deal with concrete problems of concrete indigenous peoples. Now this does not mean that this local indigenous activism is hopeless or futile or without its own successes – I think there are more and more of these successes. It’s just that the practical, daily work of an indigenous activist can be a world apart from this theory of international law and human rights instruments. To truly understand this topic of human rights and indigenous peoples, I believe we need to talk about both, the global theoretical and the local practical sides of this equation. Then we can understand the gap that is between those two, its causes, and also we can start thinking about how to reduce if not altogether close that gap. And it is for that reason that the focus of this panel discussion will be on this difference between the theory and the practice, and why I am very pleased to welcome this panel of experts, who represent both the theoretical and practical perspectives we are looking for, and most importantly, who themselves have started their careers as activists of their indigenous peoples, and some of whom have over time taken on broader roles in their countries and globally.
Let me start by introducing our panellists. That’s the most pleasant role that I can have here as a moderator, because we really have quite a unique group of experts and activists here.
First let me introduce Dr Dalee Sambo Dorough who is an Inuit from Alaska. These are indigenous peoples of the arctic. Dalee is currently the Chair of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues which is one of the three specific indigenous mechanisms of the United Nations and she has been nominated by the indigenous peoples of the arctic region. She is also an accomplished academic, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Alaska Anchorage and has an impressive track record as both an activist and an advocate of human rights of indigenous peoples in Alaska and worldwide. She was involved for several decades in the preparation of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and now continues with the same energy and passion working on implementing this declaration. Dalee is widely recognised as a thought leader in indigenous circles. She is the author of many publications and the winner of many awards, and I am honoured to call you a colleague.
Next Dr. Pavel Sulyanziga, who is one the most experienced and accomplished indigenous activists in Russia. He’s an ethnic Udege, which is a small numbered indigenous people from Russia’s far east. Currently he serves as a member of the UN Working Group on the issue of human rights and transnational corporations and business enterprises. He has also served as the Vice-President of Ripon, the Russian Association of the Indigenous People of the North. During Pavel’s leadership, this organisation became one of the most effective and impactful advocates of Russia’s indigenous peoples.
Next, and now I must take a deep breath, because Mr. Mustafa Dzemilev is the widely acknowledged and truly legendary national leader of the Crimean Tatars who are an indigenous people of Ukraine. He has dedicated his entire life to restoring the rights and dignity of Crimean Tatars, a people who have during the last 70 years experienced great injustice and suffering of genocidal proportions. He is a former long-standing chairman of the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar People, the executive representative body of Crimean Tatars, and he has also been a member of the Parliament of Ukraine since 1998. Currently he serves as Commissioner of the President of Ukraine for the Crimean Tatar People. He has received numerous international awards, the latest of which is the solidarity prize of the Republic of Poland. As a result of this year’s events, that is Russia’s annexation of Crimea, it is clear that your life’s work is not over yet and Mr. Dzemilev has taken on these new challenges with remarkable courage, with a clear and consistent message that we will also hear today. Welcome!
Next we have activist leaders from our kindred Finno-Ugric peoples. First Valentina Sovkina, who is President of the Parliament of Kola Samis that is the representative institution of the Sami people of the Kola Peninsula. She is also the director of the Kola Sami Radio and has recently entered both domestic and international news headlines because of the very strange obstacles she faced en route from Murmansk to the world conference in New York. Eventually she made it to the world conference – I saw a photo where you were waiving a Sami flag and the message was very clear: that one cannot so easily silence a Sami woman. Welcome, Valentina!
Last but not least, Dmitrii Harakka-Zaitcev who is a board member of Soikkola, a community-based NGO that unites Izhorians, a small number of indigenous people of North-West Russia. He is a lawyer by training, he has worked at the Herzen University in St. Petersburg as a lecturer of law and also as a Vice-Dean. And this year Dmitrii has been actively involved in protecting his people’s rights to their traditional lands in the face of construction of a carbomite plant. There have been remarkably successful in bringing their message to the world, without really any practical support from the outside world. Welcome, Dmitri!
Now I will ask our first speaker, Dalee, to take the floor and as I understand you will help us frame the issue of indigenous rights in the broader context of international law.
Dalee Sambo Dorough: Thank you very much Oliver for that very illustrious introduction. I hope I can stand up to those words. I would also like to thank the Estonian Institute of Human Rights for the invitation.
I want to cover very quickly a quick introduction to the UN Declaration on Indigenous Peoples and some commentary on the outcome document and the obligations of the member states in the context of general principles of international law and customary international law, and then sum up by sharing with you I think a message of urgency with regard to the rights of indigenous peoples.
As you are all familiar, I would expect, that the basic purposes of the UN Charter, the constitution of the United Nations, includes respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples. You are probably all familiar as well with the language, the opening language in particular in the International Covenants on Civil and Political Rights and Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. One of the few international instruments that affirms the collective or group rights of peoples, and Article 1, paragraph 1, “All peoples have the right of self-determination”. And as far indigenous peoples are concerned, these various international instruments, including these two covenants as well as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights or the International Bill of Rights did not embrace the distinct cultural context of indigenous peoples. To a large extent the entire human rights standards-setting exercise within the United Nations was because the current international human rights regime was not responsive to the distinct cultural context of indigenous peoples. And therefore indigenous peoples worked to pry open the doors first of all of the League of Nations – they were unsuccessful – but secondly the doors of the United Nations in order to ensure that the international human rights regime was in fact responsive to them. Largely because there are 370 million indigenous peoples across the globe who have – I won’t recite the entire history here, you are all aware of the history – who have experienced human rights violations perpetrated against them from racism to discrimination to dispossession of lands, territories and resources, genocide and a wide range of other human rights abuses.
We’re also familiar with the nature of human rights – the universality of human rights. Well, you had a human rights regime that wasn’t universal, that didn’t embrace indigenous peoples and their world views and their perspectives. But also another important element of human rights is that they are interdependent, interrelated, indivisible and interconnected. And of course this is consistent with the view of indigenous peoples in terms of their relationship to the environment, how that relates to culture, how that relates to various different social values and customs and practices and institutions, and so forth. Again the view of indigenous peoples is that their world view is that all of these things are in fact interrelated and interdependent.
Because the existing international human rights instruments were not responsive to the distinct characteristics as well as the distinct political status of indigenous peoples, the exercise of developing these standards that were responsive to indigenous peoples took the form of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. As the minister noted, adopted September 13, 2007 by the UN General Assembly. Unfortunately, four governments at that point in time voted against the declaration: Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the United States, but fortunately and subsequently those four states have now endorsed the declaration.
Article 3 of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples affirms, like Article 1 of the International Covenants, that indigenous peoples have the right to self-determination. And by virtue of that right, the right to freely determine their political status and to freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development. If you think about this broad and sweeping language, this is all the declaration should say. This is very comprehensive – these few words in terms of the place, the status and the rights of indigenous peoples. In addition, the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples is very comprehensive – there is an entire section that affirms the rights of indigenous peoples to their lands, territories and resources, those that they have traditionally owned, occupied or otherwise used or may have acquired in some other fashion.
In addition, just an example of how comprehensive and sweeping the language of the declaration happens to be, Article 31 affirms the right of indigenous peoples to maintain, control and protect their cultural heritage, but also I’ve bolded “the manifestations of their sciences, technologies and cultures”. If you think about indigenous peoples and the manifestation of their cultures, this is again very broad and very sweeping language. This happens to be only one article in the Declaration, which consists of 46 operative paragraphs, that has to be read in context with all the other articles within the Declaration.
As far as the status of the Declaration, the International Law Association has taken into account not only the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples but also jurisprudence that has arisen on the basis of the only legally binding international instrument specifically concerning indigenous peoples which happens to be International Labour Organization Convention No. 169. Although only 22 states have ratified Convention No. 169, it’s important in terms of its status as a convention. But in addition to that, the International Labour Organization itself, the staff, as well as its partners, have confirmed that the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the ILO Convention must be read together. They are complementary in nature and there is a dynamic synergy between these two different instruments.
As far as the outcome document is concerned, and I am very pleased that the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Oliver have underscored the importance of the outcome document. For me, I think it is highly critical to underscore the obligations, again by virtue of customary international law and general principles of international law, as well as now the commitments that nation states have undertaken when they adopted the outcome document. In this regard, I think it is absolutely necessary for Estonia, as one of the members of the United Nations but more importantly the position you now hold in the Economic and Social Council as well as the Human Rights Council, to undertake dialogue, either independently or in collaboration and cooperation with other states, as to how you can creatively and innovatively compel other member states of the UN to uphold their international legal obligations in relation to indigenous peoples.
And I say this in large part because it is a matter of urgency. Every day, every week, every month indigenous peoples are on the front lines of defending their rights. As we’ve already heard they’ve been criminalised for their activities, simply for trying to safeguard their lands, territories and resources. I believe that this is a matter of urgency and I believe that countries like the government of Estonia again, in concert with other member states of the United Nations, can in fact contribute to the promotion and protection and safeguarding of the distinct economic, social, cultural and political rights of indigenous peoples not only in this region, but across the globe. And challenge them to look for creative ways by which you can do so. Thank you.
Dmitrii Harakka-Zaitcev: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. I would like to thank the organisers who invited me here, and the great opportunity to see my colleagues here and some new faces.
To start my presentation, I would like to underline that at this stage, I am not going to blame or accuse anybody, or make some appraisals about somebody’s activity. My main task is to describe the current situation transparently and honestly and give people a new opportunity to make your own appraisals or decisions on what is right or wrong.
First of all, I would like to introduce who we are. We are Izhorians, and internally we call ourselves Soikollalaiset, because the last area where we lived historically belongs to our small people, is the Soikinsky peninsula. Nowadays we don’t have any objective data about the number of Izhorians. But we can suppose that in the Leningrad region we are around 300 people. We as you know belong to the Finno-Ugric group, and we have very tight relations with Ingrian-Finns, Votes, Finns and Estonians. The most important period in our nation and education was the period after the Tartu Treaty when we had a national municipality and school, books and libraries.
During the last 14 years, we have had a very visible growth of self-identity. First of all based on Russian law for indigenous people, because we were included in the special list of small numbered indigenous peoples from the very beginning in 2000. For example, our neighbours, the Votes, were included only in 2008. Now those two processes are running in parallel – the self-identification, the growth of national identity and intensive industrial expansion on our lands. I have very little time, so I decided to put a lot of information on slides. You can see what our current situation is and what we expect to have. The latest forecast: if we stop the struggle against this industrialisation of our area, we will see in the next 5-10 years a new industrial area, but with certain companies – first the Baltic carbamide plant, then ports and other factories.
We can say that the new Izhorian case started in January 2014, but we already started this discussion on industrialisation together with the Votes, our neighbours from Votia when they protested against another plant near their village. From January 2014 we can say that we have a real struggle with the administration on different levels and we have been trying to do everything we have to, in accordance with the law, without any kind of violations of Russian law, using only tools that are stated in international and Russian procedures. One thing we did was distribute information among Russian NGOs and NGOs from the Finno-Ugric world. I would like to say thank you to our friends from Fenno-Ugria who have been involved in this problem from the very beginning and have done a good job and provided good support.
So why are we fighting against it? You can see on the map which was made and distributed by the ecological NGO Green World, that this is the result of the Chernobyl catastrophe, these are the new sea terminals, this is the Leningrad Atomic Energy Station. The plan is to block the villages located on the Soikkola Peninsula by a new industrial area. It’s like a blockade. We have reasons for this protest. There are some alternative areas for industrial development that already exist in the Leningrad region. It is not necessary to destroy the natural environment of this area. Because the harm which will be done by this industrialisation is irreparable, because the landscape will be totally changed. You will come to our area in 5 years, and it will never be as it was before. What we have discussed with other Izhorians, is that the main value of our nation is nature – the sea and nature, and our holy places as well. We received some arguments against our position saying that we have never been like the indigenous people from Northern Russia or the far east. We have always been educated in schools, we have always been close to trade, to international trade – close to Leningrad, Petrograd and St. Petersburg. We don’t have any traditions. But this is not correct. Our tradition is to be at the crossroads of Finland and Estonia and Russia and Sweden. To work with the sea, to work with nature and to stay for our entire lives in our area. Nowadays we have some reaction of the local people, who are thinking of returning to 1937, because we are now in danger of being removed from our lands. This land will not be suitable for us or our children to live. I don’t have time, but I would like to show you one thing. The reaction of somebody to our protest. This information is very open. This is the so-called information bulletin of the civil initiative, which is in fact an anonymous newspaper that is distributed within 18 villages of Soikkola peninsula in supermarkets. This was distributed one or two days before the last public hearings, last Friday, and were devoted to the new master plan of development of our area until 2035. This plan was focused on the industrialisation of the area.
Here you see the current situation and here you see the proposal. So you can see that the information war started here with me, I don’t know why. I have an Ingrian flag behind me, not the Izhorian, and this is my influence on Fenno-Ugria and President Ilves and the Riigikogu (with a grammar mistake). I can consider myself as the main central person who can influence the United Nations and the Council of Europe. So it looks like a comic about a Superman, a Super-Izhorian who would like to stop the industrialisation and development of Russia.
The main idea of our community in a few words: we are still citizens of the Russian Federation. Together with other nationalities living permanently on our lands, we are struggling for our human rights, civil rights – not only rights of indigenous peoples. That is why we are trying to underline and highlight that this is not a political issue, not an international political issue or economic-political issue. For us, this is an issue of our safety and health. This is a problem of the next generation and nature. And we will do everything we can, together with our colleagues in Soikkola, and all people who live there, not only Izhorians, to use all legal procedures to protect our rights. The last question I would like to ask: do we have the tools to protect ourselves and protect our rights? Thank you.
Oliver Loode: Thank you Dmitri. Thank you for letting us know about the daily challenges that an activist like you faces, including this information war. Even though your community is just a few hundred members strong, you are still subjected to this kind of propaganda.
Dmitrii Harakka-Zaitcev: Yes, we must always control the newspapers, and we never react at all. We never call the police or try to find out who are the people who are blackmailing us or doing these jobs. We will try to find an institution that will be interested in this.
Oliver Loode: Before you sit down, I just want to say I am very glad to have such a powerful friend like Dmitri who really manages to shape the agenda of the United Nations and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. A people who has powerful leaders like that, is also a powerful people. So that’s why the situation of Izhorians is not so sad at all.
Oliver Loode: We have less than 30 minutes for a discussion and questions. I would like to start first a discussion among the panellists. Following up on Dmitri’s case – in one sense there is a lot of specific information there about the concrete location and the people and so on, but also it is probably quite a typical situation for many indigenous peoples in the world who have faced similar situations in the past. Some have succeeded in protecting their rights to their lands and territories, some have not. Because we have on this panel so many experienced indigenous activists, I would ask you to perhaps comment or reflect on what you heard, and if you have some words of advice for Dmitri and activists Dmitri, I think that would be very much appreciated. Perhaps I will ask Pavel to begin because this is exactly the theme that you work with.
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Dalee Sambo Dorough: Thank you very much. Each of the interventions are very important. But they also underscore that the concerns of the Izhorians are universal concerns for indigenous peoples – in terms of extractive industries, industrialisation. And that’s why I underscored the issue of urgency with regard to the matters. Some suggestions I would make – argue the fact that engaging in dialogue with indigenous peoples at the local level, domestically and nationally is good for the society overall. It is also good for the national economic health of the region. Too often states are aligned with extractive industries, business, and so forth and forget that engaging with the local communities – indigenous and non-indigenous – that the overall outcome is much more responsive to the principles of good governance than denying the rights and creating friction and contentious relationships. I think that the opportunity to invoke the guiding principles regarding business and human rights, the principles of good governance also with regard to engagement at the international level. I think I would urge your people and indigenous peoples generally to access the various international fora and learn about the content, the substance of your human rights. Make applications to the UN voluntary fund for indigenous peoples in order to bring your message of concern to the international level. And the final comment I would make is that with regard to the outcome document, the obligations that states undertook, it is quite interesting to highlight the fact that the Russian Federation did not disagree with the obligations and commitments that are embraced and confirmed by the outcome document. They certainly had an issue with regard to indigenous peoples and the rules of participation within a high-level plenary meeting within the United Nations, and they focused their attention to this particular element. However, they never did object to the language of the outcome document, in the way that for example Canada took the floor at the General Assembly. So my main point is that although the Russian Federation abstained from endorsing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in 2007, because they didn’t object to any of the substance or content and especially the affirmations of the purposes and objectives of the UN Declaration, that for all intents and purposes we have universal consensus that the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples represents the minimum standards to promote and safeguard the rights of indigenous peoples, including those within the Russian Federation. So I think that engagement at the international level would help to give volume to the issues you’re facing but also to the issues that indigenous peoples across the globe are facing.
Dmitrii Harakka-Zaitcev: Thank you Pavel and Dalee. We have also the problem not in our own minds. Because nowadays we are trying to investigate those instruments and also some cases from other areas, other countries. The problem is that when we make a declaration that an investor or administration should first initially agree or ask for some recommendations or suggestions from our NGO as a representative of the indigenous people within preparing the project, we face a lack of knowledge from their side. As an example, when in January we had the public hearings for the carbomite plant in our village, after the presentation of the project, people stood up and asked, “Did you take into account the interests of indigenous people, Votes and Izhorians?”, because we want to know who they consulted with. They said, “Izhorians? But there are some Votes here today, but they are only 3 people. Who are they?” This was the response of the representative of the investor. I think this position is very common both for investors and for the administration. At the same time, just yesterday in St. Petersburg, there was a working group round table devoted to a new project that started in 2014 in the Leningrad region. The name of the programme focused on social and economic development of territories of indigenous peoples, where they live. With reference to Valentina’s presentation, sometimes we have the danger that we receive funding for only cultural events from this programme, some festival for tourists, without any practical goals for certain indigenous nations. Maybe we should expect from this programme a lot of positive impact, but I am afraid, because we have this only for 2 years. And what can we do for 2 years together with the government, if the government would like us to accept this master plan of industrialisation? There is contradiction in these two processes.
Oliver Loode: Before taking questions from the audience, I would like to address one question to Mr Dzemilev. Along with Ukraine endorsing the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Crimean Tatars have become more active at various international venues. Can you articulate, what are your expectations from the international community, and that includes both the UN system and its indigenous-related mechanisms, but also the broader community of indigenous peoples that you expect to help your people’s cause.
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Oliver Loode: Now we have just a very little time for questions. Let me asked from the audience. Please.
(Question from the floor): Thank you for this remarkably interesting and very necessary discussion here. As Dmitri asked as his last question whether there are any tools to protect the rights of the indigenous people, I am asking whether you have addressed this issue through the European Court of Human Rights and if yes, have there been any landmark cases to which to refer?
Oliver Loode: We’ll take two more questions.
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Oliver Loode: I would just ask Dmitri to very briefly answer the question whether Estonia’s support is good or bad for peoples like yours?
Dmitrii Harakka-Zaitcev: May I comment quickly about the legislation first? Now there is a draft of a new law in the state Duma which restricts the transformation of agricultural lands to industrial lands. So we are expecting this new law because it will protect us in our situation. The second question – you know that historically we have a connection, Estonians, Izhorians and Finns. And nobody can say anything against it. We will communicate and we don’t want to be isolated. I would say only one thing. When we got this problem in January, we sent more than 15 official letters to from the Votian cultural society and the Izhorian community to all government institutions, to all associations, committees and to our colleagues in Estonia and Finland. And you know what kind of help we received and from whom. So I don’t want to comment anymore.
Oliver Loode: We really are out of time now. I think we could easily go on here for many hours. I would like to thank you all. We have this thought that there’s the theory and the practice and how to bridge that gap. I think one thing we have to do is have this kind of exchange between the more experienced leaders and activists and the new ones. I hope that we took a first step towards that. Thank you very much, and until next time.