News of Note 3/7/25: Oil and Gas Alarms in Peru, FPIC as ‘Right to Robust Process’, Remembering 41 Indigenous Defenders
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Peru’s Indigenous leaders raise concerns over oil and gas projects at a human rights hearing (Associated Press)
“Projects violate Indigenous rights by threatening their land, health and food security and are in breach of international obligations that require Indigenous groups to be consulted… [The Interethnic Association for the Development of the Peruvian Rainforest (AIDESEP) argues that the projects also pose risks to uncontacted Indigenous groups and also noted specific impact on Indigenous women. [...] Approximately 75% of the Peruvian Amazon — home to 21 Indigenous groups — is covered by oil and gas concessions, many of which overlap with Indigenous territories, according to the International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs.”
The Federal Court Finds That FPIC Is Not a Veto but a “Right to a Robust Process” (Fasken)
In Kebaowek First Nation v Canadian Nuclear Laboratories, 2025 FC 319, the Federal Court quashed a decision of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (the “Commission”) on the basis the Commission had a duty to consider UNDRIP when assessing the Crown’s fulfillment of its duty to consult and accommodate, and failed to do so. The Commission was wrong to find that it had no jurisdiction to consider UNDRIP or UNDA. However, the Court was clear that UNDRIP, and its requirements for FPIC, do not amount to a veto over decision-making. Rather, the Court found that FPIC is a “right to a robust process”.
In Memoriam: Remembering 41 Indigenous Defenders Who Were Murdered in 2024 in Latin America (Cultural Survival)
“Globally, 64.8% of all attacks against defenders were against those defending land and territories. Latin America is still one of the most dangerous regions to be an Indigenous rights and environmental defender, with three out of four assassinations of environmental defenders taking place there. Indigenous defenders face a double threat: defending rights and being Indigenous. In 2023, 49% of murdered environmental or land defenders were Indigenous or Afro-descendants, a disproportionately high figure given that Indigenous Peoples comprise roughly 6% of the global population.”
The Case for Returning U.S. Public Lands to Indigenous People (TIME)
“There’s also a lot of data showing Indigenous land management is more ecologically sound than government or industrially managed land. For instance, Project Drawdown, a global leader in science-based climate change solutions, estimates that returning 1,000 million hectares of land to Indigenous tenureship by 2050 would sequester over 12 gigatons of carbon dioxide.”
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