UNITED NATIONS PERMANENT
FORUM ON INDIGENOUS ISSUES
Eleventh Session, May 7-18,
2012, New York City
Joint Statement of
Indigenous Peoples Regarding the World Intellectual Property Organization
Intergovernmental Committee On Genetic Resources, Traditional Knowledge &
Folklore
Submitting
Organizations: Indigenous Peoples Council on Biocolonialism (IPCB), Fourth
World Center for the Study of Indigenous Law and Politics - University of
Colorado at Denver, American Indian Movement of Colorado, TONATIERRA, Seventh
Generation Fund for Indian Development (SGF), American Indian Law Alliance
(AILA), Ke Aupuni O Hawaii, The Kaoni Foundation, Indigenous World Association,
Chihene Ndeh, Māori Caucus comprising representation from the Te Rūnanga o Te
Rarawa, the Ngāti Kuri Trust Board, Te Rūnanganui-a-Iwi o Ngāti Kahu and Ngāti
Kahungunu Iwi Incorporated, Winnemem
Wintu Tribe, Comunidad Integradaora del Saber Andino (CISA),
Supporting
Indigenous Peoples and Nations, and organizations (not registered at
UNPFII-11): Rapa Nui Parliament,
Network for Native Futures, Consejo de Todas las Tierras, AIPIN
Thank
you Mr. Chairman,
This
statement is made on behalf of the Indigenous Peoples and Nations, and
Indigenous organizations listed above. We present the following statement and
recommendations with grave concern as to how WIPO may negatively affect our
rights to our Indigenous knowledge systems and genetic resources which have
been developed and maintained by our Peoples over millenia.
As
the original, free and independent peoples of our lands and territories, we reaffirm
our right to self-determination, and our spiritual and cultural relationship
with all life forms, knowledge systems, and ways of life within our traditional
lands and territories.
We
are the guardians of every aspect of our cultural heritage passed down from our
ancestors from generation to generation and we reaffirm our responsibility to
protect and perpetuate this knowledge for the benefit of our peoples and our
future generations
Indigenous
Peoples and Nations are the protectors and holders of every aspect of our
cultural heritage including the subject matter under negotiation at WIPO:
traditional knowledge, traditional cultural expressions, and genetic resources.
A
careful review of WIPO processes indicate it is clear that WIPO’s member states
wish to subsume Indigenous Peoples knowledge systems and cultural heritage into
the intellectual property framework of states and transnational corporations. We ask WIPO, under what moral and
legal authority do you presume to possess a right to impose an intellectual
property rights regime upon Indigenous Peoples and Nations knowledge and
resources?
Candidly,
the work undertaken at WIPO is solely for the benefit of states that want
access and proprietary rights to Indigenous Peoples’ knowledge and resources;
WIPO seeks to protect its theft of already appropriated GR, TK and TCEs from Indigenous
Peoples that is now considered to be in the public domain, or otherwise
protected with state/corporate intellectual property rights for their own
commercial benefit. As such,
WIPO reflects a modern day band of pirates and thieves continuing the process
of theft from Indigenous Peoples’ lands and territories. WIPO is actively
promoting and advancing the racist, ongoing process of the Doctrine of
Discovery.
We
say, ¡no mas!, no more! WIPO has
no right to take any more from us –not one more drop of blood, not one more
seed, not one more song or story or teaching. Nothing!
Issues Regarding Indigenous
Peoples’ Rights at WIPO
Very
serious issues exist regarding Indigenous Peoples participating in the IGC 18th,
19th, and 20th Sessions that unanimously expressed our
dissatisfaction with our unequal participation in the deliberations of the
international instruments(s) under negotiation in the WIPO IGC.
On February 20,
2012 nearly all of the Indigenous delegates in attendance decided to withdraw
from active participation in the WIPO negotiations because the right of
Indigenous Peoples, as Peoples and Nations, to participate as equals in the
negotiations continues to be denied.
Indigenous
Peoples have seen a continual process of diminishing our participation in key
small working groups, and our text proposals require the support of at least
one state to remain on the table.
Without state support, Indigenous Peoples’ proposals are ignored. State vetoes of Indigenous Peoples’
participation and proposals is intolerable and unacceptable.
The single most
significant and non-negotiable demand by Indigenous Peoples is that, at a
minimum, WIPO amend its rules of procedure to ensure the full and equal
participation of Indigenous Peoples in all processes that affect us. Until that change happens, we cannot
conscientiously participate in a process that will continue to undermine the
rights of Indigenous Peoples, and threaten our future generations.
Without
a change in the WIPO rules of procedure, it is completely unrealistic for Indigenous
Peoples to engage in any meaningful way in the WIPO process. As representatives of our Nations, we
cannot continue to sit in meetings where we are diminished and silenced, while
thieves discuss taking the most fundamental elements of our cultural heritage
for their own use.
Within
the current WIPO process, Indigenous Peoples are being denied meaningful
participation on matters directly affecting us, resulting in the denial of
Indigenous Peoples' rights as articulated within international legal norms,
conventions and within sections 18, 19, 25, and 26 of the United Nations
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The WIPO process is
dehumanizing and denying our right to participate effectively and with
integrity as Indigenous Peoples and Nations.
We challenge
WIPO to answer the following specific points: 1. What is your specific definition of the term “Indigenous”
in your draft instruments? Does the
use of the term “Indigenous” mean that you specifically recognize the
self-determination of Indigenous Peoples and Nations? Are you willing to change and to acknowledge Indigenous
Peoples as rights holders in WIPO negotiations? If not, why not?
Recommendations
1. We call upon the UNPFII to request that
WIPO amend its rules of procedure to ensure the full and equal participation of
Indigenous Peoples in all processes that are effecting them, and to ensure the
full and equal participation of Indigenous Nations and Peoples in all the WIPO
processes including the IGC, the General Assembly and Diplomatic Conference. We
call on the UNPFII to inform WIPO that if it does not change its rules of
procedure, WIPO is in violation of both the letter and the spirit of the UN
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
2. We recommend that the UNPFII make it
clear to WIPO that it has no authority to regulate Indigenous Peoples’
traditional knowledge nor does it have a right to access to such and associated
genetic resources, and that those remain under the control of Indigenous
Peoples.
3. We recommend that UNPFII and the United
Nations call for dismantling the WIPO IGC negotiations and instead to mandate
the development of true international mechanisms to protect Indigenous Peoples’
systems for protecting our traditional knowledge and genetic resources and
protecting such rights.
4. We call upon
all Indigenous Peoples to stand in solidarity with indigenous peoples who are
standing in opposition to this 21st Century version of the Doctrine of
Discovery, and withdraw our active participation in the WIPO processes on GRTKF
unless and until the States change the rules of procedure to permit our full
and equal participation at all levels of the IGC, and until the instruments
recognize and are consistent with the existing international frameworks for the
rights and interests of Indigenous Peoples and Nations within the scope of the
IGC.
5. We recommend that Indigenous Nations
and Peoples set our own legal standards for the protection of our traditional
knowledge, traditional cultural expressions, and genetic resources and we
insist that the UN inform WIPO that it must respect Indigenous Peoples’
traditions, practices and laws on these issues.
