United
Nations Permanent Forum on the Rights of Indigenous Issues
New York, NY
13th
Session, May 12-23, 2014
Agenda Item 3 – Principles of Good
Governance Consistent with the United Nations Declaration of the Rights of
Indigenous Peoples: Articles 3, 6 and
46.
Intervention
of the Oglala Lakota Nation, presented by Dr. Richard L. Zephier, on behalf of
Bryan V. Brewer, President of the Oglala Sioux Tribe, Pine Ridge Indian
Reservation, occupied Lakota Territory.
Madame Chairperson,
The Oglala
Lakota Nation welcomes the opportunity to discuss “Principles of good governance consistent with
the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples: especially
Articles 3, 6 and 46.” Under this item,
in order to discuss practices of good governance, it is also helpful to discuss
practices of bad governance – examples of what states should refrain from
doing.
I speak today
as the representative of the elected government in our colonially-occupied
homeland. Although we are the elected government, we reject the label that is
often attached to us by the government of the United States, as the “legitimate”
Lakota government. We recognize and
respect that we had and exercised political independence and self-determination
long before there was a United States or a Canada or a Brazil or a Mexico. Our traditional form of governance was
deliberately attacked and impaired through the operation of colonial
domination.
Today,
despite the fact that we are the entity that attempts to provide the daily
necessities of life for our people – to maintain roads and schools and health
facilities, we recognize, respect, and extend our hand to all Lakotas –
traditional councils, grassroots organizations, and all Lakotas who strive to
be free, self-sustaining, and independent people. As Lakotas, we stand on
common ground, in defense of our right to self-determination, our right to have
our treaties honored and respected as binding international instruments, and
for the return of our homelands – especially our most sacred area – the He Sapa
(Black Hills). We stand together in the defense of our homeland by predatory
corporations and governments, and against destructive and illegal projects,
such as the Keystone XL pipeline.
The Oglala
Lakota Nation, is the historic and traditional homeland to some of the fiercest
resistance against invasion and settler colonialism in the world; home to the great
leaders, Crazy Horse Red Cloud, Fools Crow and Russell Means; location of the
historic opposition to the United States government at Wounded Knee in 1973,
and home to the first international treaty conference in 1974, that laid the
foundation for much of the work of Indigenous peoples’ decolonization,
including the Declaration about which we now speak. The Lakota Nation has a
very long experience with the bad governance practices of invading settler
states, but today we will limit our remarks specifically to the practices of the
United States of America.
We continue
to insist that the Oglala Lakota Nation possesses the unfettered, international
legal right to self-determination. Article 3 of the UN Declaration affirms the
full enjoyment of our inherent, natural right to self-determination, without
limit and without qualification. We reject any limited interpretation of
Article 3 of the Declaration, and we recall that Indigenous peoples, in the
drafting process of the UNDRIP, demanded that the international right of
self-determination be applied to Indigenous peoples in the same manner that it
has been applied to all other peoples under colonial or foreign subjugation,
domination or occupation. The denial of the rights embodied in Article 3 by the
United States government, through its law and policies, presents a clinical case
of governance that is fundamentally inconsistent with the UNDRIP.
The Oglala
Lakota Nation further rejects the assertions of the United States government, as
stated in its announcement of 9 December 2010, that the UNDRIP calls for “a distinct international concept of
self-determination specific to indigenous peoples.” The Oglala Lakota Nation rejects the
fabricated claim of the United States that the Declaration is intended “to
promote the development of a concept of self-determination for indigenous
peoples that is different from the existing right of self-determination in
international law. “ There is nothing in the historical record, or in the
debates of the UN Working Group on Indigenous Populations, that lends any
legitimacy or credence to the U.S.’ distorted interpretation of the Declaration
or its application. For the United States, or any state, to attempt to revise
history, in an attempt to provide a unilateral and self-serving interpretation
of the Declaration, is a prima facie
case of bad governance.
In this same
light, state interpretations of Article 46, which attempt to restrict or to limit
the right of Indigenous peoples to exercise self-determination under Article 3,
is contrary to existing international law. For the United States, or any state,
to deny the right of self-determination to indigenous peoples on the grounds of
protecting the territorial integrity of an invader state is contrary to settled
international legal principles. No state
has the right to protect the integrity of territory that it has seized
illegally from another people, and then deny the right of self-determination to
the people whose homeland is under illegal occupation. The territory of the
Oglala Lakota Nation was acknowledged and guaranteed by the treaties of 1851
and 1868, between the United States of America and the Great Sioux Nation of
Indians. The deliberate state practices
of the U.S., utilizing the Doctrine of Christian Discovery, and fabricating an
entire body of domestic law, based on racial, religious and cultural supremacy,
must be explicitly repudiated by this Permanent Forum, by ECOSOC, and by the
United Nations, as a whole.
On April 22,
2014, in Kiev, Ukraine, U.S. Vice-President Joseph Biden proclaimed that “no nation
-- no nation -- has the right to simply grab land from another
nation. No nation has that right.” (emphasis added) We agree. The United
States, in constant violation of principles of good governance “grabbed” and
continues to occupy, the lands, territories and resources of the Lakota Nation.
The United States continues to occupy our territories, including our most
sacred spiritual, ceremonial areas in the He Sapa (Black Hills). It refuses to
engage in best practices in resolving the land disputes over our territories
under illegal occupation, in violation of our treaties. Because of its refusal,
the U.S. has allowed the theft of hundreds of square miles of our territory,
much of our sacred water, billions of dollars of natural resources including
gold, timber, coal, and destroyed our ability to achieve and maintain economic
self-determination.
1.
That this body call for the appointment of a
special rapporteur to investigate, document and recommend methods for UN
bodies, states and international civil society to reject, repudiate, dis-establish,
reverse and eliminate the doctrine of Christian discovery and domination,
wherever it is embodied in state law and policy, and/or wherever it continues
to appear in state theory or practice.
2.
That
this body recommend to the Economic and Social Council that the General
Assembly request, under Article 96 (a) of the U.N. Charter, an Advisory Opinion
from the International Court of Justice, regarding the international character
and enforceability of treaties between Indigenous peoples and states,
specifically the treaties between the Lakota Nation and the United States of
America.
3.
That
this body reiterate that the right of self-determination for Indigenous peoples
is not different from, nor lesser to, the right of all other peoples to
self-determination, including other peoples under colonial or foreign
subjugation, domination or occupation; and,
4.
That
this body assert that the right of Indigenous peoples to exercise our
self-determination should never be limited by an assertion of territorial
integrity that is based on the illegal invasion, domination or occupation by a
settler state against an indigenous people or nation.
Thank you,
madam Chair.
Sign ons:
Coastal Band
Chumash Nation
Indigenous
Peoples’ Council on Biocolonialism
American
Indian Movement of Colorado
Fourth World
Center for the Study of Indigenous Law and Politics
Sacred Places
Institute for Indigenous Peoples
TONATIERRA
