HRC 54 Action Canada Statement to the ID with the Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous People

United Nations Human Rights Council 54th session

ID with SR on the rights of indigenous peoples

Statement by Action Canada for Population and Development

Action Canada makes this statement with the full support of the John Humphrey Centre for Peace and Human Rights and in solidarity with First Nations, Métis and Inuit Peoples across Canada, also known as Turtle Island. 

We welcome the Special Rapporteur’s visit to Canada, his comprehensive report and actionable recommendations.  We appreciate his recognition that the wide range of human rights violations experienced by Indigenous Peoples in Canada are deeply interconnected and rooted in colonialism and racism.  We highlight the report’s assessment that the most significant advancements in the rights of Indigenous Peoples’ have been through adversarial legal processes, with increasingly high social and economic costs to communities. 

We urge Canada to honour its treaty obligations, fully implement the calls to action set out in the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the calls to justice in the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women’s National Inquiry, and to guarantee in law and practice the rights set forth in the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.  As civil society and settlers in Canada, we commit to engage with these calls to action meaningfully and to continue advocacy for accessible and appropriate mechanisms that can facilitate accountability, reparations and systems change.