Amazonian Indigenous Peoples Declare State of Emergency as territories and communities across the region face upsurge in attacks and land invasions

14 April 2021 (Disponible aquí en español)

A Human Rights Emergency for indigenous defenders of the Amazon has been declared in a public statement by the Coordinating Body of Indigenous Organizations of the Amazon Basin (COICA), which represents indigenous organisations across nine countries in the Amazon basin. Indigenous organizations in the region are raising an alert to the international community high-lighting threats and dangers they face for defending their ancestral territories. Since the beginning of 2020 there have been no less than 202 murders of human rights defenders in Amazonian countries. In a global press meeting held on 14 April 2021, representatives of indigenous Amazonian organisations emphasized that nation states must urgently put in place and apply specific measures to ensure international treaties that guarantee the rights of indigenous peoples and human rights defenders of the Amazon are implemented to protect life, fundamental freedoms and territorial rights. Indigenous leaders add that in addition to measures to protect land and territorial rights and to conserve the Amazonian rainforest,  urgent and coordinated national and international measures are needed to ensure indigenous peoples secure rights to health, education and a healthy environment.

COICA calls on international bodies such as the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), the United Nations Permanent Forum for Indigenous Issues and the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), as well as the governments of the nine Pan-Amazonian countries to carry out concrete actions of a structural scope to guarantee the right of indigenous peoples to defend their territories. COICA emphasises that urgent action is required to confront ecocide, violence and illegal land invasions that the Amazonian peoples are currently facing and resisting.

The indigenous leaders stress that this situation of insecurity and rights abuse in the Amazon has worsened since the beginning of the pandemic in 2020 and is reaching crisis levels in 2021.

Read more:

• The declaration is available here in English
• Full declaration in Spanish
• More information about COICA