The Americas

Incredible injustice for indigenous women

Editor's note: The following was named Best Editorial of 2007 by the Native American Journalists Association at its annual awards banquet July 26.

It was originally published in Volume 26, Issue 47. Indian Country Today presents it again in appreciation and acknowledgment of those who work tirelessly toward justice for Indian girls and women.

''From the oldest to the youngest, Native women are disrespected and treated in the most humiliating fashion, living and dying without justice or the knowledge that their granddaughters will live free of the violence they experienced.'' This passage, taken from testimony by Sacred Circle on the Violence Against Women Act, helps breathe life into the devastating statistics at the center of a groundbreaking report on violence against indigenous women.

Amnesty International's 113-page report, ''Maze of Injustice - The Failure to Protect Indigenous Women from Sexual Violence in the USA,'' released April 24, [2007], asserts that the U.S. government has ''created a complex maze of tribal, state and federal jurisdictions that often allows perpetrators to rape with impunity,'' and that these crimes are ''compounded by failures at every level of the justice system.''

American Indian and Alaska Native women are nearly three times more likely to be raped or sexually assaulted in their lifetimes. According to the Department of Justice, nearly 90 percent of the reported cases of rapes and sexual assault of Native women are committed by non-Native men. It is a staggering legacy for women to ''fully expect to be raped,'' as one elder stated in the report, because they are Indian.

The report contains interviews with courageous survivors and advocates, including stories of abuse and injustice so vivid, the mind does not want to believe they are true. Each story illustrates why so many survivors describe their experiences seeking justice as being raped ''all over again.'' Incompetent medical personnel, non-responsive or slow-moving law enforcement, conflicting jurisdictions and underlying racism that affects court proceedings are common obstacles...

The Americas

Día Internacional de los Pueblos Indígenas 2008 (9 de agosto)

OPS: Podemos evitar otro patrimonio en extinción

International Day of Indigenous Peoples 2008

PAHO: We can avoid the extinction of another endangered heritage

Washington, DC - ...On the occasion of International Day of Indigenous Peoples 2008, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) stated that "recent and historical processes in the [Latin American] region have identified different cultures where coexist a range of relationships that, with regards to the indigenous in most societies, are asymmetric, subordinated and conflicted."

Studies and reports prepared by the hemispheric organization reiterate that most of the 45 million indigenous people living in the Americas today are confronted by a growing inequity in health and access to basic sanitation. Dr. Jose Luis Di Fabio, Area Manager of Technology and Health Services Delivery within PAHO, said that illiteracy, unemployment, lack of land and territory, high rates of morbidity and mortality from preventable causes, and limitations on access and utilization of basic health services, education, housing and others, "are problems that still affect the majority of indigenous communities and affect their quality of life and their health."

"Minimum results"

The International Decade of the World's Indigenous People (1995-2004) was proclaimed by the UN General Assembly in 1993 with the purpose and commitment to strengthen international cooperation to help solve the problems affecting indigenous peoples in areas such as human rights, environment, development, education and health...

In its assessment of the progress in health of indigenous populations since 1995, PAHO concluded that the results were "minimal" and that the most serious problems remained "still unresolved..."

- Pan American Health Organization

August 7, 2008

Guatemala

Celebran Día Nacional e Internacional de los Pueblos Indígenas

In Celebration of Indigenous People's Day

The city of Santa Cruz del Quiche - Organizations of the Quiche Mayan ethnic community have organized a wide range of activities to celebrate Indigenous People's Day on August 9, 2008.

Among the organizations that are presenting the events are the Academy of Mayan Languages of Guatemala (ALMG), the association Ajb'atz Quiché network, Defensoría K'iche [Quiche Defense] and the municipality of the city of Santa Cruz del Quiche.

Quiche liaison Tomas Matias Gutierrez told Cerigua that there is progress in recognizing the rights of indigenous peoples in the world. The Indigenous were previously thought to be an obstacle to development.

The United Nations must recognize the existence and importance of native peoples because, despite the exclusion, marginalization and ethnocide to which we have been subjected, we are contributing to the welfare of the world.

The celebration allows sharing capabilities of science and technology with Maya people throughout society, since there are now more likely to open opportunities for participation of different sectors, changes occur in the educational system with the introduction of various Mayan elements the school curriculum.

For true harmony to exist within Guatemalan society we should strengthen the principles that to understand and accept other cultures is the only way to eliminate these prejudices, that only exist to hurt people.

The World

U.N. celebrates International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples

August 9th is the 14th International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples, and we hope you will join us in celebrating a particularly momentous year in indigenous rights. Among the milestones this year, the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in a near-unanimous vote, and the governments of Australia and Canada formally apologized for their egregious forced-assimilation policies. The event is being celebrated at the United Nations today with presentations by a range of UN dignitaries from UNESCO and the UN Development Program, as well as chair the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (and Cultural Survival board member) Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, and UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon. Ban's statement, released before the event, acknowledges indigenous peoples' "marginalization, their extreme poverty, the expropriation of their traditional lands and other grave human rights abuses" and also makes special mention of the disappearance of indigenous languages.

- Ellen L. Lutz Executive Director

August 8, 2008

See also:

Mexico, Latin America

Mujeres En La Conferencia Internacional Sobre Sida

Women's Participation at the 2008 AIDS Conference in Mexico City

About 33 million people are living with HIV globally. Some 1.6 million of these people live in Latin America. In its latest report, announced for the first time a decline in the spread of the epidemic, but it also warned of its feminization. Sixty percent of the young people between 15 and 20-years-old who are living with HIV / AIDS are women.

In Mexico, official data estimates that 115,651 cases exist. Their statistics show an accelerating increase in the rate of feminization. Over the past two decades the gender ratio of victims has risen from 23 men to three men for every female affected. Faced with this reality, public policies, care, prevention efforts and the budgeting for them, have been limited.

Violence against women is both a cause and consequence of HIV, and one of the main factors associated with the accelerated process of feminization of the pandemic.

For thousands of women, the threat of violence prevents access to information, access to HIV testing, disclosure of their HIV status, access to services to prevent HIV transmission to infants, and the receipt of treatment and counseling, even when they know they are infected.

Mexico is the first country in Latin Americas to host the global AIDS conference, which gathers health professionals, scientists, donors, personalities and decision makers, as well as non-governmental organizations and people living with HIV.

That is why CIMAC has opened this space to make visible to women living with HIV with the creation of print and radio news stories, statistics and links to other organizations dealing with the issue.