“Listening to comments from Russian opposition experts about yet another live broadcast featuring Putin (I haven’t watched those broadcasts in years), I was reminded of a story from about 10 years ago.”
United Russia was holding a meeting in Khabarovsk. Boris Nemtsov and Alexei Navalny first called it the “party of crooks and thieves.” Putin was in attendance. It was yet another staged gathering of subordinates meeting their “tsar.” This event featured not only crooks and thieves but also various activists: environmentalists, youth representatives, philatelists, motorists, and others. Essentially, it was a curated group of leader-loving citizens. Representatives of Indigenous small-numbered peoples were also invited to this meeting.
Before the meeting with Putin, a person from the presidential administration gathered us together. They began handing out pre-approved questions. We were supposed to ask Putin those questions. I refused to take a scripted question. I said that I wanted to ask about an issue that truly concerned my people. The issue was the establishment of a traditional nature-use territory on the Bikin River. In response, I was told that I couldn’t ask my question. Only those willing to read the pre-approved questions would be given the floor. I left Khabarovsk that very day.
Our elder, who agreed to ask the prepared question, remained to represent our people. The question she was given went like this: “Dear Vladimir Vladimirovich! We know you care deeply about preserving tigers. There are many tigers and poachers in our land. I ask you to toughen the poacher penalties and share your plans for saving the Amur tiger.”
The evening of questions and answers began. When our elder was given the floor, she stood up and said: “Dear Vladimir Vladimirovich! I want to share one of our problems with you. Our life is already hard as it is. Now the authorities in Primorye won’t let us catch red fish. We’ve always caught it, and it is a traditional food for us.”
I was later told that Putin’s eyes widened at the unexpected question. He did not know how to respond. So, he turned to the head of the Federal Fisheries Agency, Andrei Krainy. He made Andrei answer it on the spot.
Afterwards, our elder called me. She told me that she had been summoned to the police for questioning. Governor Darkin had ordered a criminal case to be initiated against her. In the end, nothing came of it. They couldn’t find anything to charge a pensioner with.
And that’s what these live Q&A sessions with Putin are like…
Prologue: How Our Indigenous North Was Fractured
I would like to express my gratitude to those who proposed the idea of producing this series and who discussed and brought this idea to life. And many thanks for the invitation to share my thoughts on the ongoing processes that impinge upon scientists, Indigenous people, and others who have been involved in cooperation in the Arctic for many years.
What happened on February 24, 2022, was a true blow to the global community. The death and destruction that Russia has brought onto Ukraine came as a shock to all normal people. Yet even though so many experts and politicians did not believe that such a scenario was possible, it was clear that war was a “natural” continuation of the existence of the Putin regime. It doesn’t matter with whom it will fight and who it will declare its ‘enemies’ – whether it be Russia’s civil society or Moldova, Kazakhstan, or the Baltic countries. Ukraine’s bad luck was daring to choose its own path …
Of course, this war could not help but reverberate in the so-called ‘international’ Arctic community. It was here where cooperation and friendship with Russia was mostly successful, where all parties recognized the Arctic as a ‘territory of dialogue’, where so many bilateral and multilateral ties developed, and where the Arctic Council emerged and flourished as an institution of collaboration and discussion.
2.
An active participant in many processes in the Arctic, I fully acknowledge these developments. We, the Indigenous people of Russia, achieved many important results from these processes – including equal participation in the Arctic Council and involvement in various international scientific and research projects.. In turn, such developments gave us numerous opportunities to negotiate with the Russian government regarding respect for our legal rights and interests. The Russian government was forced to act to seek solutions to our issues and challenges, being fully aware that the Indigenous people of Russia had a voice at the international level that certainly would be heard and supported.
As Arctic cooperation developed in scientific research — for instance, in the areas of safe navigation and biodiversity — cooperation among Indigenous peoples also thrived. From the very beginning the solidarity of the Arctic’s Indigenous peoples was exceptionally high. I recall how in the mid-1990s a Canadian delegation of Canadian government officials and Inuit representatives visited Russia. Vice-President of the ICC (Canada) Violet Ford led the Inuit delegates. The delegation’s mission was to meet with the Indigenous people of Russia and discuss ideas for cooperation. Kamchatka was one of the regions the Canadian delegation visited. Looking at the planned agenda, the Inuit visitors were surprised to see that their ‘business’ program in Kamchatka was full of various kinds of entertainment – visiting volcanoes, geysers and the famous Paratunka spa resort, attending concerts… Absent were any visits to Indigenous communities and there was but one scheduled meeting with Kamchatka Indigenous people.
Puzzled, the Inuit guests from Canada asked the Indigenous representatives from Kamchatka whether they had agreed with the program. It turned out that Russian authorities in charge of the program had ignored the proposals of the people of Kamchatka. Inuit leader Violet Ford demanded that the program be changed to include the proposals of the local Indigenous people. To that, Canadian government officials demurred, responding that they were only ‘guests,’ with no right to request a change to the program. ’Well,’ retorted Violet Ford (I paraphrase here), ‘in this case the Inuit would return home. We won’t participate in an event that violated the rights of Indigenous people of Russia.’ Discreet negotiations ensued, during which the program was changed to include the proposals of the Indigenous people of Kamchatka.
Once at an Arctic Council meeting in the late 1990s, representatives of RAIPON (Russian Association of Indigenous Peoples of the North, Siberia and the Far East) raised the issue of violations of the rights of Indigenous people of Russia. The Russian government officials flatly declined to discuss any such violations. I recall how Leif Halonen from the Sámi Council and
Akkalyuk Lynge from ICC immediately took our side and demanded explanations from the Russian officials on the issues raised by the RAIPON representatives.
I recall yet another remarkable incident toward the end of 2001, when the RAIPON delegation became part of the Russian official delegation at negotiations between Russia and Canada. These negotiations were led by the heads of government of two countries. It was literally on the eve of the meeting when we at RAIPON received a call from the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development Canada, asking who from RAIPON would be taking part. We didn’t even know about these upcoming negotiations! To our surprise, we were requested to go to the Canadian Embassy right away to get our visas and to fly to Ottawa the next day. Canadian officials explained that if we were to refuse, a huge political scandal would occur. The Canadian public had already been informed by media that for the first time at interstate negotiations between Canada and Russia, Indigenous peoples would not only be the topic of negotiations but active participants in these negotiations. If representatives of Russia’s Indigenous peoples were not part of the official Russian delegation, Canada’s Indigenous representatives might simply walk out in protest. We participated in the meetings and had many productive discussions and agreements with our Inuit and First Nations counterparts.
I also took advantage of this situation to again draw the attention of the Russian authorities to the problems of Indigenous people and their resolution at such a high level. At a press conference of prime ministers, I publicly asked the Chairman of the Russian Government, Mikhail Kasyanov:
“Dear Mikhail Mikhailovich, you very correctly noted that Russia and Canada have a lot in common and similarities. You also said that Canada has many achievements and much experience in issues regarding the development of Indigenous peoples. So why doesn’t the Russian government adopt this experience and begin to implement it, based on Russian realities and Russia’s international obligations?”
To that Prime Minister Kasyanov responded: “I agree with you. Let’s you and I meet after returning home.”
That meeting took place, and we agreed to create a roadmap for resolving the issues of the Indigenous peoples of the Russian North. Such work indeed started, and was quite productive. Unfortunately, however, the situation did not last long. At the beginning of 2004 the Kasyanov government was dismissed, and he lost his position.
And another great sign of circumpolar solidarity with the Indigenous peoples of Russia was the appeal of the Senior Officials of the Arctic Council to the Russian government, when in 2012 the Russian Ministry of Justice decided to suspend the activities of RAIPON. This, and many other similar instances, helped the Indigenous peoples of Russia to conduct equal negotiations with the Russian government and build partnerships with them.
I recollect these stories to illustrate how Arctic cooperation up to a certain point had been very important and progressive.
Of course, it was Russia’s military aggression against Ukraine on 24 February 2022 that was the turning point in making continued cooperation in the Arctic impossible. Nonetheless, for the Indigenous people of Russia, curtailment of cooperation started much earlier. In 2013, the Russian government and the FSB service seized RAIPON — and then turned it into a weapon against independent Indigenous leaders and activists. Today, representatives of RAIPON openly engage in propaganda at international forums (primarily at the UN and the Arctic Council). They talk about all the blessings and the paradise that the Russian state has built for the Indigenous peoples of the North. They write denunciations against independent Indigenous leaders. And after the start of the war in Ukraine, which has been supported by RAIPON, its leaders became war criminals, since they are members of the Russian parliament with whose consent this war was started.
3.
I am very pleased that the authors of this volume and series are sharing their thoughts, stories and memories of arctic collaboration, as well as their ideas about the future. For my part, I would like to express several points regarding the future of possible Arctic cooperation with Russia.
Firstly, I consider it very important that scholars who are engaged in arctic research that involves Indigenous people raise and discuss the issue of colonization of Siberia and the fate of its Indigenous residents. This is not just a question of restoring historical justice. It is an issue of eradicating the lies on which the Putin regime is based, such as Russia following a special path or the Russian people being “God’s chosen ones”. It is the need to “cure”—at least, confront— the imperialism that is rooted in the population of Russia, and most notably among its ethnically Russian citizens.
Secondly, in communicating with many colleagues (government representatives, scientists, experts, Indigenous leaders), I see how nostalgic they are for past times. They expect and hope that the Putin regime will fall – and then everything will return to normal and be just fine. To me this is a profound delusion. Things won’t be the same as they used to be before! And the sooner the arctic community–political, academic, expert–realizes this, the sooner it will be possible to begin building a new system of relations with Russia, for effective interactions in the future.
The previous system of relations regarded Russia as a friendly country “with some of its own oddities and peculiarities.” We are all witnesses what this illusion led to after 24 February 2022.
What needs to be grasped? That “there is a dangerous enemy on the other side” and its “oddities and peculiarities” are not just whims of the regime, but the sources of its strength and danger to the outside world. Going forward, any policy and system of relations with Russia must be based on acknowledging this fact.
Thirdly, and perhaps paradoxically, based on what I said above, it is necessary to continue collaboration with those citizens of Russia who oppose the Putin regime and who wish to continue cooperation with the ‘West’. These persons may not be picketing or otherwise actively protesting the regime. In the current environment in Russia to do so would be a prison sentence. A key criterion for such persons is their refusal to participate in this bacchanalia of “Z-ing” [i.e., displaying the symbol ‘Z’ in multiple forms – eds.] and of “jingoistic frenzy.”
This is especially important for the Indigenous peoples of Russia and for their future. Supporting such persons and collaborating with them also generates an atmosphere of understanding in Indigenous communities of Siberia, where everyone knows practically everyone else. By doing so even in such inhuman conditions one can remain human.
Pavel Sulyandziga, President of the International Indigenous Fund
for development and solidarity “Batani” (Batani Foundation),
Former first vice-president of the RAIPON (1997-2008),
Former member of the United Nations Permanent Forum
on Indigenous Issues (2005-2010), Former member of the United Nations Working Group
on Business and Human Rights (2011-2018)
Indigenous Peoples Reach Unanimous Agreement on Defining the Just Transition and Provide Principles and Protocols to Eliminate Harm from Renewable Energy and ‘Green’ Development
“For Indigenous Peoples, a just transition means exercising our own forms of territorial governance according to our traditions and ways of life.” –Indigenous Peoples Principles and Protocols for Just Transition
October 23, 2024 – Nearly 100 Indigenous leaders from the seven socio-cultural regions of the world have reached unanimous agreement on defining a Just Transition with respect to impacted or potentially impacted Indigenous Peoples.
Indigenous Peoples Principles and Protocols for Just Transition, the culminating document from the JUST TRANSITION: Indigenous Peoples’ Perspectives, Knowledge, and Lived Experiences Summit, which took place in Geneva, Switzerland, October 8-10, defines what the transition to “clean” or “green” energy and development must do to respect the rights and protect the wellbeing of Indigenous Peoples. The document provides 11 principles that corporate and state actors must adhere to when designing and implementing projects in the name of just, sustainable, or “green” initiatives.
“Activities that are being proposed or carried out on our lands, ice, waters and territories in the name of just transition, green economy, green/clean energy, or emissions reduction, without the obtainment of our free, prior and informed consent or which threaten our sacred places, cultural practices, Indigenous Peoples’ food sources, and ecosystems, or otherwise violate our inherent rights, are not a just transition,” states the document.
“Two years ago, we began convening Indigenous leaders from around the world to address the increasing violence, harm, and negative impacts that the so-called ‘green’ or ‘clean’ energy transition is perpetuating on our lands and to our communities – the same impacts Indigenous Peoples experience from fossil fuel extractive practices,” said Rodion Sulyandziga, who chaired the Summit coordinating committee. “The culmination was our Indigenous Just Transition Summit and this outcomes document which provides unanimous agreement about the definitions, principles, and protocols that must be foundational for Just Transition. These are the first steps for anyone – be it corporate, State, or Indigenous-led enterprise – to build a truly just, sustainable, and inclusive economy for all people of the world.”
The 11 principles for a Just Transition established during the Summit are:
1. Right to Life – Encompassing Indigenous Peoples’ physical and spiritual integrity and “guaranteeing their present and future existence.”
2. Right to Self-determination and Sovereignty of Indigenous Peoples – The “recognition, respect, and full implementation of the inherent rights of Indigenous Peoples” as affirmed by minimum standards of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) and other international instruments. This includes Indigenous Peoples’ right to freely determine their own political, social, economic development and future, and rights to equitable benefit-sharing.
3. Decolonization – Rejection of the Doctrine of Discovery and continuing impacts from “colonial and extractive resource exploitation, false solutions, military occupation, and activities that threaten our mental, spiritual, reproductive, intergenerational, and physical health, biodiversity, natural ecosystems, cultures, values, and plant and animal relatives.”
4. Reparations, Land Back, and Full Restoration of Lands – Ensuring “the return, recognition, and respect of Indigenous lands, territories, and waters, as well as the protection of all Indigenous natural resources, ecosystems, and other means of livelihood,” which “must begin with the unrestricted access, restoration, recognition, and respect of our rights to our ancestral lands, territories, and waters, and other resources that were taken without our consent…”
5. Respect for Indigenous Peoples’ Ways of Life – Guaranteeing food sovereignty, Indigenous economies, Indigenous science, technologies, and innovations, lived experiences, jurisdiction, languages, cultures, spirituality, responsibilities to the natural world, biodiversity, knowledge systems,” as well as respect for Indigenous Peoples’ knowledge, beliefs, and ancestral practices to protect our ecosystems and food systems, and uphold our sacred responsibilities to our Peoples, families and future generations.”
6. Transparency and Accountability – “Include and reflect the input and effective participation of Indigenous Peoples… [with] opportunity for active and effective negotiations, based on free, prior and informed consent regarding all projects, from the design to implementation, monitoring, and evaluation, on and affecting Indigenous Peoples’ lands, territories, resources, and waters.
7. Historical Reparations – Guarantee economic and non-economic reparations for the historical and continuing damages through “standards established by human rights courts and bodies, and as determined by the pre-existing Indigenous nations and peoples when demanding such reparations.”
8. Full Protection of Indigenous Peoples – Accounting for and eliminating “the criminalization of Indigenous Peoples’ human rights and environmental defenders, and cultural practitioners, including but not limited to extrajudicial killings, torture, imprisonments, surveillance, and other threats of harassment, intimidation, and reprisals with impunity, including the policing and militarization of Indigenous Peoples’ territories.
9. Recognition of Indigenous Peoples’ Roles and Responsibilities – Recognizing Indigenous Peoples’ roles “as caretakers, stewards, and guardians of our traditional lands, rangelands, forests, deserts, savannas, waters, air, ice, territories, and resources, our Indigenous laws and protocols, and the spiritual, cultural, historic and ongoing relationships we have with the plants, animals, elements, lands, ice, and waters which give us life and identity.”
10. Maintaining 1.5 Degrees – Providing “direct access to financing for Indigenous Peoples’ own projects for climate change aversion and mitigation, adaptation, resilience, and direct access payments for loss and damage” within the global mandate to limit rising temperatures to 1.5 degrees celsius in order to reduce and prevent climate change.
11. A Rights-based Approach to Supply Chains – Ensuring supply chains for just transition projects do “not cause harm to Indigenous Peoples, other peoples, ecosystems, or sacred sites” by “assessing the impacts of the totality of supply chains (from raw materials to end-use projects to waste).” Supply chains must avoid a “trade off benefits to one peoples to the detriment of another peoples’ lands, territories, and resources,” and “State and private actors must also ensure full transparency” regarding funding and investment sources.”
To implement these principles, Indigenous leaders at the Summit have committed to initiating processes for their Peoples to safeguard what they “determine to be critical for their survival and well-being that is rooted in their worldviews and values,” and “disseminate, promote, and defend these principles and protocols”, as well as “use them in their education, trainings, and advocacy efforts.” They will also continue to “engage and challenge regulations, standards, laws, policies, and actions that ignore their Free, Prior, and Informed Consent”, stand in solidarity with one another to oppose the imposition of “green energy” projects impacting their lands, call for “implementation of an ecosystem approach,” and “demand that Indigenous, human, environmental, and lands rights defenders be protected.”
Additionally, they have committed to considering “utilizing international human rights bodies and national, international and regional mechanisms to submit urgent complaints to stop states’ actions and rights’ violations” and refusing to tolerate any forced evictions, displacements, relocations, dispossession, and expulsion, in the name of “green transition” projects.
Towards implementation, they call for “comprehensive mapping and due diligence procedures for transition minerals development and for social, environmental, and human rights impacts,” as well as the demand for “companies, governments, financial mechanisms, private sector, all responsible parties, to take full responsibility and action for damage, loss of cultural heritage, and other adverse impacts of mining activities to human, biodiversity, ancestral lands, cultural, and spiritual practices, territories and waters.”
Sulyandziga further discussed the role of Indigenous Peoples in the Just Transition: “For too long, Indigenous voices have been marginalized. From the Amazon to the Arctic, the protection of our environment has always been intertwined with the protection of our people. We are the stewards of the world’s most vital ecosystems, from rainforests to grasslands, and we are the first to suffer when these ecosystems are threatened. The world must understand that there can be no climate justice without Indigenous justice. There can be no green transition without the full participation of Indigenous peoples. Protecting the Earth means protecting the people who have always protected it. This is our responsibility, and it is also our right. Without Indigenous knowledge, the quest for a green future is a journey without a map. And without Indigenous voices, even the greenest economy will run dry.”
Read Indigenous Peoples Principles and Protocols for Just Transition in English, En español, En français, Em português, На русском языке.
About the Indigenous Peoples Just Transition Summit
The JUST TRANSITION: Indigenous Peoples’ Perspectives, Knowledge, and Lived Experiences Summit brought Indigenous Peoples together to collectively define a Just Transition and the green economy from Indigenous perspectives. Calling for a rights-based approach rooted in self-determination; Free, Prior, and Informed Consent; cultural, land, and territorial rights; and the participation of Indigenous Peoples in decision-making, the summit presented Indigenous leaders with the opportunity to shape the future where their priorities and solutions are central to building a just and sustainable transition. (Watch the Press Conference held on the concluding day of the Summit.)
The Summit was hosted in Geneva Switzerland, October 8-10, by the Indigenous Peoples Global Coordinating Committee (IPGCC), members of which include Securing Indigenous Peoples’ Rights in the Green Economy (SIRGE) Coalition, International Indian Treaty Council (IITC); Asia Indigenous Peoples Pact (AIPP); Saami Council; Inuit Circumpolar Council (ICC); PINGO’s Forum; He Kainga Indigenous Solutions, Aotearoa; Coordinadora de las Organizaciones Indígenas de la Cuenca Amazónica (COICA); Association Des Femmes Peules & Peuples Autochtones Du Tchad (AFPAT); Nyungar Nation; United Confederation of Taino People (UCTP); and Center for Support of Indigenous Peoples of the North (CSIPN).
Other participating organizations and partners include: Acal El Hejeb / Indigenous Amazigh Network AZUL – Morocco; Aliansi Masyarakat Adat Nusantara (AMAN); Association Repare Promotion de l’éducation et Accès aux Soins des Filles et Femmes – Burkina Faso; Association TUNFA – Niger; Batani Foundation; Beaver Lake Cree Nation; Camp Morningstar; Central Unica Nacional de las Rondas Campesinas del Perú CUNARC-PERÚ; Centro de Estudios e Investigaciones Comunidad de Historia Mapuche; Centro de Investigacion de Tecnologías Aplicadas al Qullasuyu (CITAQ); Comunidad de Historia Mapuche Lof Boroa, Ecuador Runacanapac Tandanacui; Comunidad Indígena Colla Comuna de Copiapó; Consejo General Kuna de Panama; Cultural Survival; DOCIP; Earthworks; Family Support Centre – Botswana; ICCA Southeast Asia; International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs (IWGIA); Kanawayandan Daaki – Land, Air, Water, Spirit; Laguna Acoma Coalition for a Safe Environment; Lmartin People Association – Kenya; Marka Tahua Aranzaya Maranzaya Yonza; MBOSCUDA – Cameroon; National Indigenous Disabled Women Association-Nepal (NIDWAN); NDN Collective; Nepal Federation of Indigenous Nationalities (NEFIN); Observatorio de Derechos de los Pueblos Indígenas-UMSA; Parlamento de Naciones, Pueblos y Comunidades Indígenas de Jujuy; Pgayenkaw Association for Sustainable Development (PASD); PIDP – Shirika la Bambuti – DRC; Pit River Nation; Promotion of Indigenous and Nature Together (POINT); Saami Parliament, Norway; Sarawak Dayak Iban Association (SADIA); Society for Threatened Peoples; Tobpinai Ningkokoton Koburuon Kampu (TONIBUNG); Ton-kla Indigenous Children and Youth Network; Tonkla Indigenous Children and Youth Network (TKN); Tooh’ Diné Bi Keyah; Torang Trust; Tsehay Golgota Community Development Organization – Ethiopia; Unissons nous pour la promotion des Batwa (UNIPROBA) – Burundi; Yaqui Nation Traditional Authorities, Vicam Pueblo; and Youth Council in Saami Parliament, Norway.
Mobilization, Low Life Expectancy, and Extremism: Key Highlights on Indigenous Peoples’ Rights in Russia from the UN Special Rapporteur’s Report
Mariana Katzarova, the UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Russia, delivered a report on the state of human rights in the country during the 57th session of the United Nations.
Katzarova highlighted the harsh suppression of protests by ethnic minorities and Indigenous peoples in Russia, particularly demonstrations advocating for environmental rights. She referenced the persecution of activists in Bashkortostan as an example. Among the political prisoners, she cited Yakut shaman Alexander Gabyshev, who was sentenced to forced psychiatric treatment for his “pilgrimage against Putin.”
The report also mentioned the designation of the fictitious “Anti-Russian Separatist Movement” as an extremist group, followed by the classification of 55 independent Indigenous organizations, including those from the Arctic regions, as “extremist.”
RAIPON (Russian Association of Indigenous Peoples of the North), which officially handles the rights of Indigenous peoples in the Arctic, was involved in adding these groups to the extremist list. However, RAIPON has been criticized for acting as a government policy tool and lobbying large companies. This was documented in an investigative report by “Arctida,” in collaboration with “Verstka.”
Katzarova noted that Russia’s mobilization efforts for the war disproportionately target Indigenous peoples and individuals who recently gained Russian citizenship — mainly migrant workers. According to Katzarova, “this poses an existential threat to some small Indigenous groups due to the heavy military losses they have sustained.” Russia does not disclose the ethnic breakdown of its military casualties, nor does it publish overall casualty figures.
She also pointed out that Indigenous peoples in Russia suffer from some of the lowest life expectancy rates in the country. Despite this, the Russian government continues to reduce subsidies and impose restrictions on their access to support, particularly through the registry of small Indigenous peoples. Katzarova called on the Russian authorities to end the discrimination and violence against Indigenous communities and urged UN member states to support those being persecuted in Russia.
The mandate for the UN Special Rapporteur on Russia was established on October 7, 2022, and is held by Bulgarian human rights advocate and Amnesty International representative Mariana Katzarova. Russia does not recognize this mandate and has denied Katzarova entry into the country.
Sourced from arctida.io
The Russian State Duma was asked to protect the lands of the indigenous peoples of Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug (KhMAO) from oil developers.
Representatives of the “Public Radar” project asked the State Duma of the Russian Federation to protect the lands of the indigenous peoples of KhMAO from oil developers.
On January 24, 2024, Surgutneftegaz offered the indigenous residents of the Surgut region of KhMAO compensation for oil extraction on their land. The company wanted to pay locals for their lost profits from the sale of berries and animal skins, which they harvest on the territory needed by Surgutneftegaz.
According to a representative of the human rights project “Public Radar,” people refused the compensation at a meeting with the company, considering it too low. In March, Surgutneftegaz began oil production.
Human rights defenders discovered that, by law, oil companies are not required to pay compensation to small indigenous peoples engaged in traditional activities. This is due to a gap in the law: the registries of the indigenous population and traditional land use territories are not synchronized.
— Usually, if families do agree [to compensation], the oil companies may occasionally purchase equipment for hunting and northern life (snowmobiles, boats, gear) for them, but this is done voluntarily, without any contracts, — said “Public Radar.”
Human rights defenders submitted their ideas for legal amendments to Oleg Mikhaylov, a State Duma deputy from the Communist Party (KPRF). They propose simultaneously entering data into both registries, prohibiting oil companies from calculating compensation for residents based on the cost of skins and berries, and suspending companies’ operations if they extract resources without consent.
On April 29, 2024, it became known about the death of Sergey Kerimov, the last defender of the lake sacred to the Khanty people. He died of cancer. The man fought against oil extraction by Surgutneftegaz near Lake Imlor. He tried to defend his encampment and was forced to relocate more than 20 times at the oil company’s request, freeing up land for them.
The activist was tried three times: in 2017, he was sentenced to community service for threatening Surgutneftegaz, and in 2022, he was given six months of restricted freedom. In December 2022, Kerimov had a conflict with the police, after which he was charged with using violence. Tuvan journalist Sayana Mongush wrote that Kerimov’s underage son was killed in a car accident by drunk oil workers.
Presentation for the session “Mapping Indigenous Peace-building Today : Research and Policy.” April 11, 2024 Institute of Peace First Global Summit on Indigenous Peacebuilding
“Action Anthropology, Indigenous Rights and Changing Agendas in Siberia”
Marjorie Mandelstam Balzer, Georgetown University [email protected]
Introduction
In the 1990s, Siberian leaders and First Nations activists learned from each other through MacArthur Foundation cultural exchanges in Russia, the US, and Canada that I helped organize. It was an early effort at international peace strategizing, focused on defending and protecting Indigenous rights to land and resources. This Institute of Peace Summit continues that legacy in a bigger way in these perilous times. The mantra of ‘nothing about us without us’, spreading globally among Indigenous communities in the 20th century, has led to reassessments of how educated Indigenous leaders interact with those who come to study their societies. Basic respect and rapport centred on what issues local communities themselves consider urgent are keys to new approaches to research and policy, especially concerning war, interethnic tensions and peace building. Burning concerns in Siberia, in the context of Russia’s increasingly dangerous and destabilized society, include: “Who owns Native culture?”, “Can protests help peace efforts?” , and “How do intertwined and economically dependent Indigenous communities become post-colonial?”
The most rewarding of my fieldwork in the republics of Sakha, Buryatia and Tyva has been collaborative, including co-authorship and co-theorizing, especially with one of the founders of ethnosociology in Sakha Republic — Uliana Vinokurova. Uliana in the post-Soviet period was a member of the Sakha parliament, called Il Tumen, “Meeting for Agreement”, itself a notable marker of Indigenous consensus values. She’s a well-known Sakha defender of the republic’s over seven Indigenous communities and was a speech writer for the first post-Soviet Sakha president of the republic. As one of the authors of the republic’s sovereignty- oriented 1992 Constitution, she participated in one of the early post-Soviet efforts at bringing democracy to her republic, in the process blowing all sorts of stereotypes about Indigenous peoples. The professionally diverse members of the committee spent a year reading every constitution they could to choose how they wanted to construct their own state-within-a-state. For Uliana, peacebuilding with Moscow was based on ideals of nested sovereignty, non-chauvinist nationalism for everyone, and negotiated, real federalism. One of her important lessons has been: “Never declare separatism or independence for anyone until they do so themselves.” However, in the context of Russia’s aggressive war against Ukraine, and the disproportionate mobilization of non-Russian Siberians to fight and become cannon fodder, some Indigenous Siberians are indeed becoming independence minded, are reconfiguring definitions of civil war, and are fleeing Russia into increasingly politicized Siberian diasporas.
Background for post-Soviet Indigenous Research and Policy Empowerment
In Russia in the 1990s, the activist group RAIPON [Russian Association of the Indigenous Peoples of the North] was able to help shape pressing legal and research agendas, but after 2011 it was disempowered.[1] This sad history is appropriately told by one of the key activists, Pavel Sulyandziga, then-Vice-President of RAIPON, who is present at our Summit. A collaborative community monitoring Indigenous rights and urbanization trends has been exemplified by Pavel Sulyandziga, Mikhail Todyshev, and Ol’ga Murashko (2002), Rodion Sulyandziga, Dmitri Berezhkov, and the work of Russian legal anthropologist Natal’ia Novikova with Nenets scholar Yelizaveta Yaptik (2018). Sensitivity to changes in Russian laws and to issues of cultural appropriation was also reflected in anthropology of Siberia projects funded internationally during and after Soviet Union disintegration. Legal, economic, and ‘action’ anthropology, including issues of ecology, sovereignty, identity, and de-escalation of interethnic conflict characterized a range of collaborative projects sponsored by the MacArthur Foundation and the U.S. National Science Foundation.[2]
Among the most sensitive issues are contested sacred lands, especially sacred burial grounds. In addition to dangers of non-consensual industrialization, climate change, forest fires, and earthquakes, threats from archeologists loom large in many Indigenous worldviews. All have converged in the Altai, where the renowned Scythian (Pazyryk) mummy of a resplendent female was discovered in 1993 on the Ukok Plateau. Indigenous protests have galvanized local communities against the unearthing of the ‘Altai princess’, her scientific examination in multiple countries, and her museum incarceration in Gorno-Altaisk, in a glass-enclosed pseudo-tomb, most outrageously paid for by the state-affiliated energy company GAZPROM.[3]
Collaborative Work with Uliana Vinokurova
Concerns about the shifting dynamics of self-determination, identity and interethnic peace have dominated my work with Uliana. One year, while in Alaska on one of the MacArthur Foundations exchanges, I asked her what she thought my fieldwork focus for the next summer should be. She quipped “why don’t you find out why these pesky Evangelical missionaries from the US think there’s a spiritual vacuum in our republic?”
Uliana was born into a large, loving, hospitable Sakha family in the northern region of Sredniaia Kolyma, in a village of Sakha, Yukaghir, and Ėveny. Her education in psychology and sociology served as springboards for a worldview she calls ‘ecosophy’ and advocacy for what she terms Indigenous methodology.[4] When she twice won as deputy to the Il Tumen(1992-2003), some in the republic perceived her as Ėvenki, or as mixed ethnic, in part due to her vigorous defense of legislation promoting the economic well-being of ‘small-numbered’ peoples in the Sakha Republic. When occasionally she was called a ‘Yakut (Sakha) nationalist’ in Moscow, Uliana countered any false impression of chauvinism with charm and humour, saying ‘all Russians are welcome in our republic, as long as they treat her as a mother to be cherished and not a mother-in-law’.[5]
In the chaotic emergence of debates about nationalism and transparency over ethnic tensions, the MacArthur Foundation project ‘Ethnic Conflict in the post-Soviet World’ was created and led on the Russian side by Leokadiia M. Drobizheva.[6] At my request, Uliana and I were matched for a 1993 Prague conference and 1996 book. We saw the Sakha Republic (Yakutia) as a major ‘swing’ territory (one-sixth of Russia), of enormous diamond and other mineral wealth with sustainable development potential, that could become unstable or could emerge from Soviet-style resource-extraction colonialism into a multi-ethnic federal republic (Balzer & Vinokurova 1996).
We argued that to stabilize the society, past interethnic tensions needed to be exposed and analysed rather than propagandized out of existence with ‘brotherhood of the peoples’-type slogans. Given Chechnya’s declarations of secession, and Tatarstan’s unrest, some outside analysts were overgeneralizing about domino-like secession movements in Russia. Uliana explained that the Sakha Republic could ill-afford to secede and risk the well-being of ‘already ailing Northern Natives’, the Ėveny, Ėvenki, and Yukaghir. She declared Russian-led regions deserved as much self-rule as ethnic-based republics, and that Russia could be viable with multi-leveled patriotism in a matrioshka federal state structure. Fascinated by Yael Tamir’s (1993) concept of ‘liberal nationalism’, she also insisted that ‘for many, the appetite for greater sovereignty has grown in the eating’, and that the republic’s peoples had the right to their own constitution, passed before Russia’s was ratified.[7]
Our activist anthropological approach, which included trends in Sakha cultural revival politics, was meant to balance the rights to cultural assertion and self-rule, a degree of sovereignty, with understanding of economic and strategic realities inherent in negotiated federalism. We presaged the concerns of a budding ecology movement by warning that a ‘psychology of immediate gratification has led to terrible ecological destruction in mining and lumbering areas and to ethnic tension’, and we concluded that ‘the best antidote against virulent forms of nationalism is a well-managed federalism’ (Balzer & Vinokurova 1996: 164, 173).
Reflecting many years later on the anniversary of the 1992 Sakha Constitution ratification, a jubilant moment in Sakha history when celebrants poured onto Yakutsk streets, Uliana explained that despite the unfulfilled hopes for greater sovereignty after 2000, the 1990s represented an important period when Sakha were able to better understand their history of self-awareness as a people with legacies of literacy and leadership dating to the early 20th century. ‘The value of sovereignty itself became a spiritual basis for the self-identity of the Sakha people’ (email, 12 December 2021).
Anti-war Activism and Peace-building
Since February, 2022, when Russia’s army invaded Ukraine in a full-scale illegal attempt to absorb a neighboring country, conditions for Indigenous Siberians have worsened considerably. They were already among the poorest, and thus most likely to be tempted by higher salaries offered by the army. When the war began, non-Russians were mobilized in high numbers, trained inadequately, forced to provide their own equipment and clothing, and sent to the front lines. Consequent casualty rates have resulted in highly disproportionate numbers of Siberians being killed in Eastern Ukraine.[8] This is shown by a well-researched BBC/Mediazona map indicating first year casualties [9] that reveals Tyvans, Buryats and Sakha, to be the groups with the highest mortality rates. In contrast, Moscow and St Petersburg have less than 0.7 deaths per 100,000. The map uses official statistics; actual casualty numbers of minorities are even higher. The pace of non-Russian, especially Buryat, deaths has accelerated since then.[10]
Siberians such as Buryats and Tyvans often combine Buddhist values with beliefs inherited from pre-Buddhist and pre-Christian spiritual values and upbringing.[11] These Buddhist and shamanist traditions mean that Siberians have been brought up with strong non-violent or “ethics of balance” beliefs concerning killing of humans or hunting of non-human persons. It is extremely difficult for many Siberians to condone Russia’s violent aggression and continued war in Ukraine since it runs against their non-violent understanding of best-practice human relationships and human interactions within the natural world. The Ukraine war is painfully against the Indigenous values that many consider their true heritage, and I therefore do not trust public opinion data from the republics that indicate a majority are pro-Putin and pro-war. Protests in the form of public prayers have occurred in Buryatia and Altai.
For some Sakha, especially a group of women activists, pacifist values were expressed in a 2022 protest demonstration in the main square of their capital, Yakutsk, expressed quite dramatically in the form of a chant-dance called okhuokhai. This powerful expression of creative politics was traditionally used to chant improvisational poetry in honor of the summer solstice, often in the contexts of major ceremonial meetings of numerous Sakha clans, including for meetings of negotiation and agreement concerning inter-tribal relations. It resulted not only in a protest that was viewed on non-official social media all over the world, but also in a serious crackdown and arrest of nearly all the protesters.[12]
Conclusions
Despite the high costs, I believe the courageous Siberian protests that have resonated especially with the non-Russian communities and republics in all of Russia, have significance as models exemplifying hopes for a better, less racist and more democratic society. Whether ultimately, Indigenous communities choose secession, despites threats of crack-downs and civil war, will depend on them and the urgent need for their traditions of calm negotiation and consensus building to be re-activated. This requires brave leadership, especially including women. In the last two years, a fascinating set of creative protests using traditional cultural idioms — Buddhist prayer, okhuohai, camel sacrifice – has meant that Indigenous leaders sometimes signal one message to insiders (the need to stop the Ukraine war and bring sons home) and another to outsiders in Moscow (we are patriotic and support our fighting sons).
Research and policy decisions must be driven by Indigenous leadership. For non-Native “ally” researchers, personal values, compatible worldviews, rapport, and similar research goals are interactive, growing during collaboration. Environmental activism based on principles of ecological interconnectedness (ecosophy) has become particularly perilous, as have anti-war stances. Open-minded, equality- based partnership between Western and Indigenous scholars could allow deeper thinking about interactive processes of peacebuilding policies.
[1] RAIPON was founded in the late Soviet period but suspended and then coopted in 2011 (cf. Balzer 2016).
[2] The NSF projects were guided first by Noel Broadbent, and then anthropologist of Chukotka Anna Kerttula. An example is Vera Solovyeva (2021), present here. Issues of land, development, and rights also featured in the early 21st century programme of the Scott Polar Research Institute (University of Cambridge) and the Northeast University of Sakha Republic, led by Piers Vitebsky and Florian Stammler. This programme has resulted in numerous excellent coauthored publications. An example is Habeck and Belolyubskaya (2016). See https://www.s-vfu.ru/en/projects&activities/joint_research/ (accessed 14 September 2022).
[3] See especially Gertjan Plets, Nikita Konstantinov, Vasilii Soenov, and Erick Robinson (2013), a collaborative European-Altaian project; and Tadina (2020). For perspective on “Indigenous methodology”, see Vinokurova 2018b, c).
[4] Uliana A. Vinokurova is Director of the Circumpolar Civilization Research Center at the Arctic State Institute of Culture and Arts in Yakutsk. Among her many publications, see Vinokurova (1992; 1994; 2011; 2018a, b, c); Vinokurova, Shilin & Lapina (1995). She published in Marjorie’s journal, influencing themes and introductions, in 1995, 2008, and 2014. For more on our interactions, see Balzer (2011, 2021).
[5] Among the accusers was Director of the Institute of Ethnography and Anthropology (later of Ethnology), Valery Tishkov, leader of the Academy of Sciences and UNESCO project ‘Ethnicity, Conflict, and Agreement’ that produced significant volumes on many of the republics in the 1990s and was successor to the 1980s’ Social Science Research Council project on ‘Ethnic Processes’ founded by Yuliian Bromlei.
[6] The Prague conference, held in a palace donated by Václav Havel, was the first of several where the coauthors were able to participate as collaborators. The late Leokadiia Drobizheva, then in the Institute of Ethnography and Anthropology of Russia’s Academy of Sciences, was known for saying that ethnic polarization begins at the centre, with Moscow policies, rather than in the republics. A mentor of Uliana’s, she trained many prominent sociologists of the republics, especially after she became Director of the Institute of Sociology. U.S. leaders of the MacArthur and IREX-funded project included Women in International Security (WIIS) founder Catherine Kelleher, who later helped Uliana fulfil a dream of taking Native Siberian women leaders on a tour of the United States and Canada to meet Native American women leaders. It resulted in Uliana’s monograph in the Sakha language about First Nation education and self-rule (Vinokurova and Tret’iakova 1999).
[7] Sadly, 1992 Sakha Constitution was later revised to correlate with the 1993 Russian Federation Constitution.
[8] See https://foreignpolicy.com/2022/09/23/russia-partial-military-mobilization-ethnic-minorities/, last visited March 18, 2024.
[9] Available at: https://www.reddit.com/r/UkrainianConflict/comments/11cf11i/new_map_of_dead_soldiers_per_capita_in_russias/, last visited March 18, 2024.
[10] baikal-journal.ru/2023/06/20/u-muzhchiny-iz-buryatii-veroyatnost-umeret-na-vojne-primerno-v-75-raz-vyshe-chem-u-moskvicha/), in part using BBC data from demographic-research.org/volumes/vol48/31/48-31.pdf , last visited March 19, 2024.
[11] See https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/R/bo16552160.html, last visited on March 18,2024.
[12] See Marjorie Mandelstam Balzer https://russiapost.info/regions/polarization, last visited April 9, 2024; https://novayagazeta.eu/articles/2022/09/25/women-protest-against-mobilisation-in-yakutia-police-break-up-protest-authorities-claim-it-was-held-in-support-of-mobilised-men-news including a video clip of arrests.
Yulia Navalnaya’s Decolonization Critique Proves That Russia’s Liberal Opposition Hasn’t Been Listening to Indigenous Voices
At the Bled Strategic Forum in Slovenia, Yulia Navalnaya, widow of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, delivered a speech emphasizing the need for a unified European strategy towards Russia. While much of her address echoed previous calls to support Russian civil society and democracy, one particular segment sparked controversy among Russian-speaking social media users.
Navalnaya remarked: “Some advocate for the immediate ‘decolonization’ of Russia, suggesting that breaking up our vast country into smaller, supposedly safer states is the solution. However, these ‘decolonizers’ fail to explain why people with shared cultural and historical roots should be separated, nor do they offer a clear path for how such a process would unfold.”
After her speech was translated into Russian and shared on social media by Team Navalny, it was met with criticism from ethnic and decolonial activists. Many were offended, pointing out that advocates for decolonization have long explained the concept, emphasizing self-determination and its relevance to Russia’s future.
The backlash highlights a persistent issue: Team Navalny, a major opposition group, appears reluctant to engage with the perspectives of Russia’s Indigenous populations, whose views on the country’s colonial past and present are often at odds with the mainstream opposition narrative.
Indigenous communities found Navalnaya’s comments particularly hurtful, viewing them as an echo of Kremlin propaganda that portrays decolonization efforts as dangerous separatism. They also criticized her failure to acknowledge the ongoing repression of ethnic and Indigenous activists by the Russian state. The tone of the Russian translation of her speech, whether intentional or not, was perceived by some as threatening.
Many on social media voiced disappointment and anger, with several Indigenous activists reaffirming their right to self-determination, independent of Moscow’s influence.
It’s important to recognize that Navalnaya’s speeches likely reflect the collective position of Team Navalny and the Anti-Corruption Foundation, rather than her personal opinions. The anti-decolonization rhetoric is aimed at courting certain Western liberal politicians and right-leaning audiences, who often harbor anti-Indigenous views.
This message also aligns with the Russian liberal opposition, largely made up of middle-class urbanites from Moscow and St. Petersburg, who tend to overlook the historical exploitation of Russia’s regions and ethnic republics, which have contributed to the prosperity of central Russia.
From the perspective of Indigenous activists, the push for Russia’s “Europeanization” seems misplaced, especially given that a significant portion of the country lies in the Caucasus and Asia, home to diverse peoples with unique cultures and histories of colonization.
This controversy underscores the deep divide between Moscow-based liberals and Russia’s Indigenous communities. As a result, many Indigenous groups are likely to continue charting their own course for the future, independent of the mainstream opposition movement.
The situation reveals the complex intersection of politics, ethnicity, and historical grievances within Russia’s opposition, and the challenges of crafting a unified vision for the country that addresses the concerns of all its diverse populations.
“We are nobody here…” A report from Yugra, where oil workers are displacing the Khanty from their ancestral lands
In the summer of 2024, human rights advocates from the “Public Radar” project appealed to Russian authorities with a proposal to amend legislation allowing industrial companies to exploit lands traditionally used by Indigenous peoples. This initiative stemmed from complaints by residents of the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug – Yugra, where oil companies have been building infrastructure on ancestral lands for decades without the owners’ consent.
These ancestral lands, legally known as territories of traditional nature use, are granted to Indigenous peoples for activities like reindeer herding, fishing, and gathering berries and mushrooms. However, these communities do not have ownership rights over the land.
Oil companies, by contrast, operate with few restrictions. Although regional laws require them to coordinate with Indigenous representatives before establishing infrastructure, refusal is not an option. The federal agency Rosnedra issues oil extraction licenses without considering the Indigenous stance. Therefore, negotiations often focus on compensation rather than consent.
If any Indigenous community members refuse compensation and simply ask that no oil extraction occur on their land, the drilling proceeds regardless. The dissenters are told to file complaints, where the legal machinery of the oil corporations works against them.
As a result, many Indigenous communities have resigned themselves to the situation. The bravest only fight for fair compensation, as the oil infrastructure not only occupies their land but often malfunctions, leading to oil spills. In places where oil contaminates the soil, reindeer cannot graze, and berries won’t grow.
A correspondent from “Kedr” visited the ancestral lands in the Surgut district of Yugra to document how corporations are displacing Indigenous peoples from their territories.
This article discusses the current struggles of the Indigenous peoples of Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug: what they are fighting for and their current demands.
We previously covered how the Khanty fought to protect their lands and way of life in past years, even pushing for a referendum to ban the expansion of oil drilling, only to be suppressed by the authorities, in our report “Oil – The Provider”.
Forbidden Territory
“You need to warn me to stop; I might forget and drive you straight to the checkpoint, and no one will get through. Russians aren’t allowed at the camps unless they’re oil workers,” said Anatoly Vandymov, a Khanty man, driving an old car through the taiga. We were headed 150 km from the village of Nizhnesortymsky to Anatoly’s ancestral lands, where he lives with his family and where his two dozen reindeer graze.
Our party included Vandymov, me, and a guide named Oksana, with whom I would navigate the forbidden area. In the 2000s, the company Surgutneftegaz set up checkpoints and began restricting non-Indigenous residents from accessing oilfields and ancestral lands. Initially, this was done at the request of the Khanty themselves, who were frustrated by outsiders hunting and fishing. But over time, these restrictions turned against the Indigenous people: now, the Khanty need Surgutneftegaz’s permission even to visit neighboring ancestral lands where oil is being extracted.
The journey from Nizhnesortymsky to the camp takes about two hours, a trip Vandymov makes several times a week to buy supplies. Anatoly, aged 40, is short and, like many Indigenous people, looks younger than his years. At home, his four children and wife wait for him, while his eldest son has already grown up and found a bride.
Vandymov, like nearly everyone here, works for Surgutneftegaz as an inspector, checking for pipeline ruptures. According to Anatoly, locals are rarely promoted to higher positions within the company, and there’s no other work in Nizhnesortymsky that allows them to maintain their traditional lifestyle. Anatoly adds with a grin that he took the job at Surgutneftegaz to keep an eye on the oil workers and what they do on his land.
In his spare time between shifts—two weeks on, two weeks off—Vandymov fishes, tends to his reindeer, and hunts.
To enter Khanty ancestral lands, we had to pass through the oil company’s checkpoint, located halfway between the village and Vandymov’s lands.
“The guards at the checkpoint are often rude to locals. There was an incident with my younger brother; they wouldn’t let him onto our lands because he was traveling with another Indigenous man whose lands are elsewhere. When my brother asked to see their documents, they told him he ‘wasn’t grown enough to ask for documents’—he’s 22! When he threatened to report their behavior, one of the guards said that if nothing happened after the complaint, he’d beat my brother up. How can they act like this? Whenever we complain or speak to the media, security becomes stricter, and the guards’ rudeness increases,” says Anatoly.
Eventually, the security staff received a disciplinary talk, according to the company. Surgutneftegaz responded to Anatoly’s complaint by saying, “We conducted a preventative conversation with the security guards regarding inappropriate behavior towards citizens.”
Non-Indigenous people who do not work in the oil industry are not allowed past the checkpoint—even to visit Khanty friends. The Khanty believe Surgutneftegaz fears environmentalists or journalists might infiltrate oil extraction zones. Indigenous people from other areas cannot pass the checkpoint without permission from the company’s Indigenous Affairs engineer.
The car stops a couple of kilometres before the security checkpoint. From here, Oksana and I continue on foot through the burned forest, where a fire swept through last year. Our feet sink into the deep moss.
Suddenly, a reindeer appears among the blackened trees. It has strayed from its herd and looks around nervously. Oksana tells me we must catch up and photograph it to find its owner, but the reindeer allows only a distant snapshot before fleeing at the slightest movement.
Reindeer are not just livestock for the Khanty. Their hides are used for clothing, and they pull sleds through deep snow into the taiga.
“Reindeer can live without humans, finding their food, like lichen. But they must be supplemented with grain or fish, and in summer, smoke is used to drive away mosquitoes,” says my guide.
We eventually reach the road where Anatoly is waiting. The drive continues for another hour and a half. This industrial road was built by Surgutneftegaz, and the oil workers often remind locals that they benefit from it, though it wasn’t built for the herders but to transport employees and oil. There are about a hundred exploration wells, cluster pads, oil and gas extraction workshops, pipelines, and gas turbine power stations on Vandymov’s ancestral lands.
Anatoly’s family has held these lands for three generations. He and his wife, mother, and brother’s family tend a herd of twenty reindeer. However, herding is becoming increasingly difficult due to expanding oil extraction.
“We have few reindeer, but it’s hard to manage them because of the roads where they are often hit by cars, and the pollution. We’re forced to move farther away, but we have less and less land.”
The oil workers bury domestic waste and spilled oil products near the well pads. During accidents, oil leaks are supposed to be cleaned up and removed, but the companies cut costs. When there’s a spill, they scrape off the top layer of soil and bury it nearby, contaminating the groundwater, explains Anatoly.
The source: https://kedr.media/stories/my-zdes-nikto/
Just Transition Indigenous Summit will be held on October 8-10 in Geneva
The Just Transition Indigenous Summit aims to address the impacts of the energy transition on Indigenous communities and prioritize their perspectives and solutions. Scheduled for October 8-10, 2024, in Geneva, this summit will convene over 100 representatives from Indigenous groups across the globe.
As governments and corporations pivot towards a low-carbon economy to address the climate crisis, there is often a neglect of the rights of Indigenous Peoples as defined in the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP). These rights include the principles of self-determination and Free, Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC). The summit intends to challenge conventional narratives regarding the Just Transition and underscore the necessity of integrating Indigenous values and rights into all phases of project development and implementation.
The objective of the summit is to affirm a rights-based approach relevant to any extractive projects proposed on Indigenous lands. It will establish criteria and safeguards that align with the principles of Just Transition. Discussions will focus on ensuring that projects do not replicate the harms associated with fossil fuel extraction and other traditional resource developments.
This summit represents a significant gathering where Indigenous Peoples from seven socio-cultural regions will unite to collectively redefine the Just Transition and the notion of a “Green Economy” from their distinct perspectives.
Rodion Sulyandziga, Chair of the Indigenous Peoples Global Coordinating Committee, emphasizes the importance of Indigenous-led initiatives within the broader context of environmental policy and resource management, underscoring the commitment to the protection and upliftment of Indigenous voices in the transition to a sustainable future.
The Just Transition Indigenous Summit serves as a pivotal platform for advocating the rights of Indigenous Peoples, driving forward their priorities and contributions in the ongoing movement towards a more equitable and sustainable global economy.