Our work with Indian peoples has for years drawn connections between indigenous land rights, environmental protection and human rights. In most indigenous cultures, separating these issues makes no sense. Our Purpose Statement points out the intersection of these threats to indigenous peoples:
"Indian nations and tribes and other indigenous communities throughout the world are afflicted by poverty, poor health and discrimination. ... When indigenous peoples are deprived of their ways of life and their ties to the earth, they suffer. Many have disappeared completely."
Almost all of our projects, including our work with the Yukon River Inter-Tribal Watershed Council in Alaska and the Yukon Territory and with the Assiniboine and Gros Ventre Tribes of the Fort Belknap Reservation in Montana, address the inextricable relationship between land rights, environmental health, and human rights.
Representatives from the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe in North Dakota addressed the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva, Switzerland, today to garner international opposition to the construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline near the reservation.
Mining company challenging State of Montana decision to require comprehensive review of mining activity
During the pandemic, some Latin American countries were so focused on dealing with Covid that they got distracted from other menaces like drug dealing. In Peru, a cocaine production boom has sieged indigenous territories and some national parks. CGTN America's Dan Collyns brings a story about Narcos versus drug dealers in Peru.
Media Contact
Andrew Werk, Jr., President, Fort Belknap Indian Community
406-390-2650 (mobile) | 406-353-8305 (office)
andy.werk@ftbelknap.org
The Goldman Environmental Foundation today announced Rodrigo Tot is among the six recipients of the 2017 Goldman Environmental Prize, the world’s largest award for grassroots environmental activists.
In February 2015, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights transferred Agua Caliente’s petition to Guatemala, formally launching the first phase of the procedure.
Video and resources from the October 9 panel discussion, "Indigenous Peoples’ Lands and Development: World Bank Interventions and Lessons Learned" (More...)
El máximo Tribunal de Guatemala tomó una decisión histórica hace casi seis meses que se presume hubiera arrojado una ola de cambios a nivel nacional para los pueblos indígenas. Sin embargo, el Gobierno de Guatemala no ha implementado esta orden judicial de manera adecuada y oportuna. El caso versa sobre el derecho colectivo de propiedad sobre la tierra de Agua Caliente, una comunidad Maya Q'eqchi' de 385 personas en El Estor, en la provincia de Izabal del país.
For more than 15 years, the Center has provided legal representation to the Assiniboine and Gros Ventre Tribes of the Fort Belknap Indian Reservation in their fight for environmental justice and clean-up of the contamination caused by the Zortman and Landusky gold mines adjacent to the Fort Belknap Reservation. Through lawsuits and public pressure, we helped the Tribes shut down the mines – once the largest heap-leach g
The Center has a long history of environmental advocacy in Alaska.
United States
Multilateral development banks (MDBs) and some national development banks play a central role in the approval of large-scale development projects, such as dams and forestry initiatives, which have had devastating effects on indigenous peoples and other local communities. The Center works to ensure that these financial institutions respect the environment and human rights of indigenous peoples in all their development activities.
