#indigenous-rights

#indigenous-rights

I am a young Xipai Indigenous man, and have lived my entire life in a village in the middle of the largest tropical forest on the planet, the Amazon. As an Indigenous man, I know very well the pain of the forest, because its body is an extension of ours. When I speak of the body of the forest, it is neither this nor that; it is everything.

Brazil's Petrobras has been given permission to drill for oil near the mouth of the Amazon River, casting a shadow over the country's green ambitions as it prepares to host UN climate talks. Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, the president, has come under fire from conservationists who argue his oil expansion plans clash with his image as a global leader on climate change. Brazil will host Cop30 climate talks in the Amazon city of Belem next month.

After two decades of political debate, a government-led commission voted on Friday against creating the Yavari Mirim Indigenous reserve, a 1.2m-hectare (2.9m-acre) expanse of pristine rainforest along the border with Brazil. The tally was decisive: eight against, five in favour, with three members absent from the crucial vote. The rejection comes despite evidence of human presence deep in the forest.

On August 9 and 10, a massive storm over southeastern Wisconsin dropped up to 13 inches of rain in just a few hours, sending floodwater gushing downriver and destroying more than 1,800 homes in Milwaukee. The disaster was the second-worst two-day rain event in the United States since 1871. "For years, scientists have warned about what can happen when climate change supercharges extreme weather events. This is exactly what they meant," the Milwaukee Sentinel Journal reported, describing the disaster as a 1,000-year flood.

For the first time in centuries, a piece of their ancestral territory belongs to them.

Liberation doesn't happen in a chant or one dance or a happenstance. Liberation is a quiet prayer, a big shout, a demand from an elder.

Lula approved a bill easing environmental licensing rules but vetoed or altered 63 out of nearly 400 articles due to pressure from environmental groups.

Prime Minister Mark Carney's early initiatives included meeting with Indigenous leaders and appointing the first Indigenous head of Indigenous Services Canada, Mandy Gull-Masty.

The Amazon is not a resource to be exploited, but a living, breathing archive of ancestral knowledge, dignity, and resistance.

"We were displaced from our homes, back in 1957, my mom, dad, I, sister and my brother lived up in Deer Flats for two weeks for my dad to find a house, and you think the city would have been more considerate in finding us a place," Rosales said.

Rudy Rosales, a community leader, described his family's hardship during displacement, indicating the city’s lack of support in finding replacement housing after losing their home on Dutra Street.

The Australians are pretty wound up about the idea of you seeing the Aborigines at all, Sawers wrote in a note to Blair. Their high commissioner rang me to press you not to see them: they were troublemakers.

Oklahoma's public schools only banned the reenactment of land runs as a part of history lessons in 2014, highlighting a delayed acknowledgment of its history.

This is not just about history. It's about healing what is still happening with regards to Sixties Scoop survivors, Millennium Scoop survivors, birth alerts and the over representation of children in the child welfare system who carry invisible pain.

The Dakota Access Pipeline protest became a pivotal Indigenous-led movement, addressing critical issues of water protection, land rights, and tribal sovereignty, magnified by militarized responses.

"Before God and all of you here assembled, we express our regret and ask forgiveness of the Sámi people."

In 'Yanuni', Juma Xipaia stands as a formidable advocate for Indigenous rights and the Amazon, portraying the stark realities of environmental politics in Brazil.

Brazil's upcoming oil exploration auction is seen as a critical step toward becoming the world's fourth-largest oil producer, igniting debate over economic growth vs environmental responsibilities.