South American Indian Council – CISA                                                spanish-español

statement at WG on United Nations’ Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
20 November - 1 December 2000

Formal plenary (22/11/2000)
Core issues:
- Self determination
- Lands
- Natural resources.


Thank you Mr. Chairman,

I am addressing you on behalf of the South American Indian Council - CISA. Let me repeat what I said yesterday, namely that, since 1981, my organisation has produced a myriad of documents and proposals concerning self-determination and
the right to land and natural resources, for which reason I will refrain from repeating their content.

I intend to use the little time available to me to comment upon the speeches already given by other state representatives. Since I do not have enough time to mention all of them, I shall confine myself to the statements made by the Canadian and Finnish representatives.

These two nations are trying to introduce the idea that the modern,“fashionable” approach is to classify self-determination into two categories: internal and external. Internal self-determination corresponds to civilised, democratic and advanced countries, whilst external self-determination corresponds to colonial situations (which, as a matter of fact, supposedly no longer exist today) and is invariably linked to secession.

The Canadian representative considers that, since Canada is a democratic country, its indigenous peoples are only entitled to internal self-determination.

However, over the last few years, the people in Quebec have had to vote in order to decide whether they wished to form a new state or whether they wished to continue to belong to Canada; that is to say, they have, in fact, achieved the
greatest possibility of exercising external self-determination.

This situation prompts us to reflect upon exactly what it is that has led to the fact that, in Canada, certain people are able to exercise this right whilst others are not. There must be a reason for this; I have only been able to think of three hypotheses, but no doubt there are many more.

The Canadian state has made an exception of Quebec since the people who requested self-determination are of European origin and speak a Latin language; i.e., they are human beings. In this case, indigenous peoples would not have enjoyed
this right since they have not reached such a degree of biological evolution. However, I shall put this hypothesis to one side since it risks being considered as too Darwinist.

The fact that the above-mentioned state granted this possibility to the people living in Quebec because they faced a colonial situation in relation to Canada, means that the indigenous peoples do not have this right because they never suffered
colonialism, either internal or external. However, since colonialism is not only related to exploitation, rather it is likened to something which is not civilised or advanced, it is difficult to conceive it in this particular case without giving rise to embarrassment.

Canada has been obliged to accept this fact since it found itself up against a situation outside its control; that is to say, in order to accept the situation, the state considered that it had to be imposed and not be an object of dialogue. Now, the indigenous peoples living in this nation have always called for dialogue. The situation is a somewhat sad, but thought-provoking one.

I repeat, there may be many more hypotheses, but they will always come to the same conclusion. It is clear that, in Canada, what has been permitted for some people will not be permitted for others, which risks bringing discrimination and even selective racism to mind. As a result, this paradoxical situation detracts from the value of Article 3 on the rights of indigenous peoples, as drawn up by the Canadian government, although its good intentions, stated therein, can be contradicted and denied by the very facts themselves.

I pass now to the statements made by the representative of Finland. He upholds his theory of internal self-determination by proposing an amendment to Article 45 of the draft Declaration in the light of Article 8.4 of the United Nations (1992) on the rights ofminority groups. I should like to point out that he has chosen the wrong document since indigenous peoples are not minorities; they are peoples who lived in a country prior to the creation of the nation. Agreements on minority groups are
too insignificant for indigenous peoples, for which reason the United Nations has given its support to this draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

In conclusion, I should like to reiterate my organisation’s point of view; that is to say, that self-determination can not be classified as internal or external. This kind of division seems rather to constitute a clever way to avoid discussion since internal self-determination is modelled on the individual rights and associations which nations grant to their indigenous peoples, in the same way as to any other inhabitant. This division, which clarifies absolutely nothing at all, merely serves to enable speeches to be prolonged interminably and nations to continue to take advantage of the territories and natural resources of their indigenous peoples. Moreover, the very fact of linking such external self-determination to secession is but a way of scaring the non-indigenous population with regard to indigenous peoples.

Thank you very much.

Nolasco MAMANI

Tomás CONDORI

Geneva, 22 November 2000