Incomindios (International Committee for the Indigenous Peoples of the Americas) is a human rights organization that focuses on the rights of the native populations of North, South, and Central America. It is headquartered in Zurich, Switzerland with a branch in London, UK.
The organization was founded in 1974 on the suggestion of members of the International Indian Treaty Council.
Since 2003, the organization has been given non-governmental organization status (Category II) at the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations.
Today Incomindios Switzerland has over 1,000 members and is headquartered in Zürich.
Incomindios Switzerland was founded to give Indian groups access to the UN Working Group on Indigenous Populations in Geneva. This task continues through the efforts of a voluntary task force.
Other voluntary working groups are involved in efforts for the release of Leonard Peltier, against uranium mining in Indian lands, and for improved education and communications infrastructure for Indians.
The three key focuses of the organizations are:
The International Labour Organization (ILO) is a United Nations agency whose mandate is to advance social and economic justice through setting international labour standards. Founded in October 1919 under the League of Nations, it is the first and oldest specialised agency of the UN. The ILO has 187 member states: 186 out of 193 UN member states plus the Cook Islands. It is headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, with around 40 field offices around the world, and employs some 3,381 staff across 107 nations, of whom 1,698 work in technical cooperation programmes and projects.
The American Indian Movement (AIM) is a Native American grassroots movement founded in July 1968 in Minneapolis, Minnesota, initially centered in urban areas to address systemic issues of poverty, discrimination, and police brutality against Native Americans. AIM soon widened its focus from urban issues to include many Indigenous Tribal issues that Native American groups have faced due to settler colonialism of the Americas. These have included treaty rights, high rates of unemployment, Native American education, cultural continuity, and preservation of Indigenous cultures.
The Assembly of First Nations (AFN) is an assembly of Canadian First Nations represented by their chiefs. Established in 1982 and modelled on the United Nations General Assembly, it emerged from the National Indian Brotherhood, which dissolved in the late 1970s.
Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, previously known as the Inuit Tapirisat of Canada, is a nonprofit organization in Canada that represents over 65,000 Inuit. Their mission is to "serve as a national voice protecting and advancing the rights and interests of Inuit in Canada."
Fundação Nacional do Índio or FUNAI is a Brazilian governmental protection agency for Indian interests and their culture.
Uncontacted peoples are communities or groups of indigenous peoples living without sustained contact to neighbouring communities and the world community, and includes "indigenous peoples in voluntary isolation". Legal protections make estimating the total number of uncontacted tribes challenging, but estimates from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in the UN and the non-profit group Survival International point to between 100 and 200 tribes numbering up to 10,000 individuals. A majority of tribes live in South America, particularly Brazil, where the Brazilian government and National Geographic estimate between 77 and 84 tribes reside.
Service Civil International (SCI) is an international peace organisation. Since 1920, it organises international volunteering projects in the form of workcamps and it was the first organisation worldwide to do so. The organisation was founded by Swiss pacifist Pierre Cérésole in the aftermath of World War I in order to foster understanding and a culture of peace between people from different countries.
The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, formerly called the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, is an umbrella group of American civil rights interest groups.
The International Commission for Alpine Rescue (ICAR) is an international association of mountain rescue organization. Founded in 1948, ICAR is headquartered in Kloten, Switzerland.
The International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs (IWGIA) is an independent and non-profit international human rights-based membership organization, whose central charter is to endorse and promote the collective rights of the world's indigenous peoples. Established in 1968, the IWGIA is registered as a non-profit organization in Denmark, with the head office of its secretariat based in Copenhagen. IWGIA's work is primarily funded by the Nordic Ministries of Foreign Affairs and the European Union.
Indigenous people under the nation-state have experienced exclusion and dispossession. With the rise in globalization, material advantages for indigenous populations have diminished. At times, national governments have negotiated natural resources without taking into account whether or not these resources exist on indigenous lands. In this sense for many indigenous populations, the effects of globalization mirror the effects of the conquest in the mid 16th century.
The Saami Council is a voluntary, non-governmental organization of the Saami (Sámi) people made up of nine Saami member organizations in Finland, Norway, Russia, and Sweden. Since its founding in 1956, as one among the first indigenous peoples' organizations, the Saami Council has actively dealt with Saami public policy tasks. The secretary was previously sited in both Helsinki and Utsjoki, and now in Karasjok. The Saami Council is funded by a range of grants, and their engagements are based on decisions, statements, declarations, and political programs from the Saami Conference held every four years.
Indigenous rights are those rights that exist in recognition of the specific condition of the indigenous peoples. This includes not only the most basic human rights of physical survival and integrity, but also the rights over their land, language, religion, and other elements of cultural heritage that are a part of their existence and identity as a people. This can be used as an expression for advocacy of social organizations, or form a part of the national law in establishing the relation between a government and the right of self-determination among its indigenous people, or in international law as a protection against violation of indigenous rights by actions of governments or groups of private interests.
Pan-Indianism is a philosophical and political approach promoting unity, and to some extent cultural homogenization, among different Native American, First Nations, Inuit and Métis (FNIM) groups in the Americas regardless of tribal distinctions and cultural differences.
Loriene Roy is an American scholar of Indigenous librarianship, professor and librarian from Texas. She was the first Native American president of the American Library Association when she was inaugurated in 2007.
The International Indian Treaty Council (IITC) is an organization of Indigenous Peoples from North, Central, South America, the Caribbean and the Pacific working for the Sovereignty and Self-Determination of Indigenous Peoples and the recognition and protection of Indigenous Rights, Treaties, Traditional Cultures and Sacred Lands. The IITC was formed in 1974 after a period of increased social activism of the 1960s and 1970s, during which the American Indian Movement was born, at a gathering on the land of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, in South Dakota. This gathering, and the IITC which resulted from it, was called for by the American Indian Movement, and was attended by delegates from 97 Indian tribes and Nations from across North and South America. Since 1977, the IITC has been recognized by the United Nations as a category II Non-governmental Organization (NGO) with Consultative Status with the UN Economic and Social Council, making it the first indigenous NGO to gain such status.
Alyn (Alan) Ware is a New Zealand peace educator and campaigner in the areas of peace, non-violence, nuclear abolition, international law, women's rights, children's rights and the environment. He has served as the Global Coordinator for Parliamentarians for Nuclear Nonproliferation and Disarmament since it was founded in 2002.
