UN Special Rapporteur of the Human Rights Council on the Rights of Indigenous peoples, Ms Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, spoke at Columbia University.
On October 26th, 2015, Ms Tauli-Corpuz spoke at Columbia invited by the University Seminar on Indigenous Studies. The event was co-sponsored by Columbia’s Institute for the Study of Human Rights, the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race and the Center on Sustainable Investments.
In the report and her presentation, the Special Rapporteur stated that she views the present report as the starting point for that issue, which she intends to be of continuing importance throughout the course of her mandate.
As a starting point for her ongoing work on international investment and free trade regimes, she discussed a number of areas of concern, relating both to direct violations of the rights of indigenous peoples and the systemic impact of those regimes on their lives and communities.
The Special Rapporteur contends that investment clauses of free trade agreements and bilateral and multilateral investment treaties, as they are currently conceptualized and implemented, have actual and potential negative impacts on Indigenous peoples’ rights, in particular on their rights to self-determination; lands, territories and resources; participation; and free, prior and informed consent. That is not to suggest that investments are inherently destructive. Future studies will focus on how investment agreements can be equally beneficial for indigenous peoples and investors.
The report and the Special Rapporteur’s presentation highlighted her analysis of the unjust elements of the prevailing system of global economic and financial governance and the constriction of the protective capacity of States and local governance systems. She discussed how indigenous peoples, as some of the most marginalized in the world, bear a disproportionate burden of a system that contains systemic imbalances between the enforcement of corporate investors’ rights and human rights. She concluded that both a more thorough review of implications of international investment and free trade agreements and deeper policy and systemic reforms are needed to ensure the respect, protection and fulfillment of Indigenous peoples’ rights.
