Indigenous peoples say G-8's economic agenda responsible for global warming, food crisis

Enlarge Photo Indigenous peoples say G-8's economic agenda responsible for global warming, food crisis

Fri, Jul 4 09:53 PM

SAPPORO, Japan (AP) _ A gathering of indigenous peoples on Friday blamed the Group of Eight's economic agenda for global warming and rising food and fuel prices the very problems the G-8 leaders plan to tackle at their summit next week. Wrapping up a four-day conference for indigenous peoples held in Hokkaido, Japan's northern island, the group issued a declaration expressing "profound concern over the state of the planet.

" "We believe that the economic growth model and modernization promoted by the G-8, which suggests that we can control and dominate nature, is flawed," read the statement from the group, which brought together representatives from 11 countries and 17 ethnic groups, including the Ainu, the indigenous people of northern Japan. "This dominant thinking is responsible for climate change, the global food crisis, high oil prices, increasing poverty and disparity between the rich and the poor, and the elusive search for peace," it said.

The group urged the G-8 to adopt more "sustainable consumption practices" that have been practiced by native peoples for centuries. "We are not saying we are totally against markets.

We believe in small markets, local markets," Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, chairwoman of the U.N. Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, said at a press conference. "We don't believe in shaping your whole economy to provide the luxury needs of the people in rich countries," she said.

"We believe a market should provide goods and services for the use of its citizens." The group plans to give the declaration to Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda to be distributed to the other G-8 leaders during their summit at Lake Toya, south of Sapporo, this coming Monday through Wednesday.

With climate change a key topic at the G-8 summit, indigenous activists highlighted that the G-8 members the U.S., Japan, Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Russia and Canada are among the biggest emitters of greenhouse gases linked to global warming. "Indigenous peoples are among the most impacted by the effects of climate change" because of their "close relation to their environment," said Ben Powless, a Canadian and member of the Mohawk people.

The group also called on the U.S., Canada and Russia to adopt the U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, approved by the U.N. General Assembly in September 2007. That nonbinding declaration affirms the equality of more than 370 million indigenous peoples and their right to maintain their own institutions, cultures and spiritual traditions.

The U.S., Canada, Australia and New Zealand voted against the U.N. declaration because it was incompatible with existing laws. Russia abstained.

"Because our struggles are just, as long as we stay firm in our demands, we will be able to get somewhere," Tauli-Corpuz, a member of the Igorot people of the Philippines, said during the final plenary session of the conference, attended by 350-400 people on each of the four days. Despite voting against the U.N. declaration, Australia apologized in February to its indigenous people for past mistreatment, and Canada apologized in June to its native population for the country's past assimilation practice of taking children from their families and forcing them to attend state-funded schools.

The group gathered in Sapporo also welcomed the Japanese government's recognition for the first time last month of the Ainu as an indigenous minority long an Ainu goal. They also called on Tokyo to issue an official apology to the Ainu for its past assimilation policies.

Tokyo's recognition of the Ainu as an indigenous people carries no legal implications, and an eight-person committee has been created to discuss what further policies the government might take. The indigenous conference's statement criticized the makeup of this panel, which includes only one Ainu.

More than half the panel should be Ainu, it said.

Inside News

Editor's picks