Human rights
Indigenous peoples
Here you will find our coverage of the issues experienced by Indigenous people.
In these articles, you can learn how communities are combating colonizers and polluters to resist mass evictions and the destruction of their lands. You can also find inspiring stories exploring how Indigenous-led movements are redistributing land and wealth to their rightful owners and using new technology to preserve their ancient languages, culture and customs. Below are a selection of articles on this topic.
Letter from Shapajilla: The Storyteller
Stephanie Boyd reports from an Amazonian village where traditional ways of life are changing with modern times.
The Ogiek won reparations, now they want results
One year after a court ruling, the Ogiek are still waiting for reparations. Amy Hall reports on a case that could change the lives of Indigenous people across the region.
Returning Indigenous ancestors home to New Zealand/Aotearoa
For centuries, museums have held human remains as artefacts. Hana Pera Aoake explored what can be learned from the programme driving the push to bring Māori and Moriori ancestors home?
Standing firm against fracking
The Mapuche people in Argentina are saying no to an influx of transnationals trying to frack their lands. Grace Livingstone reports.
‘Our whole truth will come out’
Roxana Olivera reports on the indigenous women who could make legal history by holding a Canadian mining company to account for its operatives overseas.
‘Fortress conservation’ is driving us from our homes
Pranab Doley, an Indigenous activist from the Mising people, condemns the militarization of the conservation industry in India and beyond, and its threat to the land’s best protectors.
Let the people protect the forests
Want to restore and protect the world's forests? Then uphold the rights of the people who live in them, says Danny Chivers.
‘Indigenous people respect all species’
An interview with environmental activist Hindou Oumarou Ibrahim.
Kids locked up
Amy Hall speaks to the campaigners leading the call against childhood incarceration of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.
Two Demons: Covid-19 and abuse
Stephanie Boyd on the making of a groundbreaking indigenous film about the pandemic in Peru’s Amazon.
Temperature check
Danny Chivers is buoyed up by three decisive victories led by indigenous groups against fossil fuel interests in Australia, Brazil and Canada.
Saving rivers, saving lives
An epic struggle has been playing out between islanders defending their land, rivers and livelihoods and the Malaysian government’s vision of ‘development’.
The indigenous resistance against Jair Bolsonaro
Jair Bolsonaro may be in power, but the Sateré indigenous people are not taking his hostility sitting down. Sue Branford reports from the Brazilian Amazon.
Catching the cops
Aboriginal people are using a new app to record and report police brutality. Will it help break Australia’s culture of impunity? Ian Lloyd Neubauer reports.
Do we fetishize indigenous people?
Working on a documentary about the Moken ‘Sea Gypsies’ prompted Julian Sayarer to examine the West’s obtuse gaze and representation of indigenous people.
The coerced sterilization of Indigenous women
The shocking eugenicist policies can be seen as attempted cultural genocide, argues Jaipreet Virdi
Independence thwarted, for now, in French Pacific
The non-indigenous people of New Caledonia assumed they would easily win an independence referendum. The results were a surprise. Nic Maclellan reports.
Walter Aduviri – hero or criminal?
Human rights defenders are being criminalized in Peru. John Crabtree highlights the unusual case of Walter Aduviri.
Indigenous lives matter in Canada
Thousands of Canadians – indigenous and non-indigenous – took to the streets in cities across the country after an all-white jury acquitted a white farmer who shot and killed a young indigenous man in Saskatchewan, Canada writes Janet Nicol
Raising voices to stop rape in Bangladesh
The Bangladeshi state is intimidating indigenous human rights defenders. Amy Hall reports.
Meet Anabela Carlón Flores
Nick Dowson speaks with the indigenous lawyer and campaigner fighting a gas pipeline in Mexico.
Young indigenous women block violence in Brazil
Young people in Brazil reconnect with their African roots, by Amy Hall.
Drawing strength from our ancestors
Bertha Zúñiga Cáceres talks about her mother’s example and how ancestors accompany our struggles.
Agribusiness seizes Brazilian power
Vanessa Baird writes on how agribusiness has mounted a coup against rural Brazilians.
No celebration of colonization
Why First Nations people boycotted Canada’s 150th anniversary of confederation. Sian Griffiths reports.
VIDEO: ‘This is cultural genocide’
Colombia’s Indigenous communities fight for cultural survival. Hazel Healy reports.
Indigenous rights: Justin Trudeau’s elephant in the room
The Canadian PM had promised change to the treatment of First Nations, but Jasmine Andersson shows how hopes have been frustrated thus far.
The story behind the EZLN’s decision to enter Mexico’s presidential race
If their candidate wins, they’ll be the country's first female president, but not the first indigenous person to hold the office. Ryan Mallett-Outtrim reports.
Two decades of struggle: Mexico’s Indigenous Congress, in images
This year’s gathering became a celebration and a moment of soul searching for Mexico’s indigenous movement. Ryan Mallett-Outtrim reports in this photo gallery.
Against their will
Roxana Olivera meets indigenous women in Peru who are still waiting for justice, two decades after being forcibly sterilized.
2016: Time to take the leap
Naomi Klein and her team speak to Marienna Pope-Weidemann about the significance of The Leap Manifesto.
The seeds of peace
Imprisoned Colombian indigenous leader Feliciano Valencia talks to New Internationalist.
There’s a lot more at stake than didgeridoos
Amarina Smith looks at the lack of protection for indigenous traditional knowledge in Australia and beyond.
‘Our language is our soul’: saving Aymara
Alexia Kalaitzi on the fight to digitally preserve this indigenous American tongue.
