 Aloha and welcome to Cooper Union, what's happening with human rights around the world. Today we'll be looking at the 20th anniversary of the UN World Conference against racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia, and related intolerance. Today, although very important, today is the international day for people of African descent. We're actually celebrating that for the first time ever. And through this observation, the UN is aiming to promote the extraordinary contributions of the African diaspora around the world, and to eliminate all forms of discrimination against people of African descent. Last week, of course, you'll remember, we had two fellows that are participating in the international decade for people of African descent that were in Geneva and participating remotely. But today, we're looking at the UN World Conference Against Racism, known as the Durban Declaration of Program of Action. And I'm so honored to welcome Kenneth Deere. Kenneth Deere was a participant. He participated in regional meetings leading up to it. And we're going to reflect today on what that Durban Declaration of Program of Action means to decades later. Kenneth, thank you so much for joining us today. Well, thank you. It would be a pleasure to be here. Kenneth, I remember why did you think it was so important to make sure that you attended the Durban Declaration program of action? Well, it's racism. Indigenous people are victims of racism, just like people of African descent, just like people, Jewish people, Armenians. Indigenous people have been victims for centuries, particularly European contact. Racism is based on the concept of racial superiority. And some people feel they're superior to others. Their race is superior to another race. And when we got in contact with the Europeans, that has been one of the fundamental issues between Europeans and Indigenous because they didn't consider us equal. And also, the whole doctrine of discovery is also based on that. And when the Pope decided that if we weren't Christian, then we didn't have any right to own the land. And we had no more rights than the animals in the lands that they discovered. So those are the fundamental basis of racism against Indigenous people. So it really was important that Indigenous people have a voice and not be forgotten in the World Conference in Durban, South Africa. And the Durban Conference, I remember, it started on 31st of August. Many people arriving. And then it went all the way through 7th of September, just right before 9-11. Could you walk us through maybe what it takes to participate in a World Conference against racism and how that negotiation process happens? And if you want to share about the North America prior, I know there's a lot of regional mechanisms. And it was that decade, right, where there was the World Conference on Human Rights as well. That was quite significant. Yeah, we were in the era, the hot era, I think the height of the World Conferences. You know, the, you know, the Earth Summit, I think was in 92 and 93 was the human rights one in Vienna. There might have been others before that, but then you had the racism in 2001 and sustainable development in 2002. The World Conferences were big at that time. And, you know, when you have a United Nations World Conference, because it has to have a bringing together the whole world, there's a whole lot of peripheral meetings that happened before you go to the World Conference. And so our region, you know, that North America is part of, it's called WEO, Western Europe and other governments. So I've taken all the states in Western Europe and the other governments are Canada, United States, Australia and New Zealand. So this region like wraps around halfway around the world. And so, and the World Conference works is that you have five regional conferences in each of the five regions. And the outcome documents from those, from those regional meetings, you know, contribute to the outcome document of the World Conference. And as you, we all know, a World Conference is not about the bells and whistles. It's not about the movie festivals and all the other activities, cultural activities and the singing and dancing. The World Conference, the real issue of the World Conference is the outcome document. What comes out, the official UN document that comes out of the World Conference. And that's the key. All the other stuff is window dressing. And so we have to focus, not on the window dressing, we have to focus on the content of the outcome document. And it's a huge document. There are different declarations, like a small book. And so there's a lot of material in that document. So in addition, people had to participate in the regional meetings in each of those five regions, you know, in Latin America, then in Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe. So as much as possible, indigenous people had tried to participate. In some regions, of course, they're more successful than in others. But we did have a pretty good voice. I think we had a strong voice. There were a lot of indigenous people who took part in those meetings and regional meetings. And then when the World Conference itself came up, there was a lot of indigenous people. And it's important to be there. You've got to be visible. If you're not visible, states won't forget about it. You'll ignore you and you'll end up in an unhappy situation with the outcome document. Personally, I was there as a journalist. The officer of the High Commissioner of Human Rights in Geneva invited, I think there were seven indigenous journalists. I think there were eight. I can't remember the number. And I was one of them. So I had a press badge. So I was fortunate. I could be in the meetings and also I could be in the press. It was huge media center. So I was able to take advantage of that. The United Nations is very, very careful. They don't like activists posing as journalists and shudder that I would do that. And so but I was there as a journalist and we were able to use our media access to get into places that some representatives can't get into. And vice versa. There were some places as a journalist. We weren't allowed to go either. So it's a little bit of a give and take. But it's important in us that we had a journalist there to record what would happen and also to influence other media to make sure the other media are aware of the indigenous presence in Durban. No, really, when we look at the Durban Declaration and although the standard of non-discrimination has been established as a bedrock principle of international law, a persistence of racism and racial discrimination, xenophobia and radar tarts clearly demonstrates the need for new ways to address the problem with more resolve, more humanity, greater efficiency. And we could see that when we're there. I mean, you sharing the going back and forth, it makes me think there was also the civil society report that was being written on top of the official one. And at that point, the High Commission for Human Rights, it's Mary Robinson. And I also remember the idea of bracketing text and maybe share some of those stories and those aspects of what was going on in Durban. And of course, it'd be the whole city, right? So you'd have to go to the official space and then community centers and all around. The World Conference is huge. It was over a lot of space. Not only was the conference center where the politicians were, but there was also the stadium. The whole issue, I think if I remember correctly, civil society was still a young term at that time in Durban. It was a new concept before it was NGOs, non-government organizations. And they want to have a nicer word. They used civil society and probably broadened. You didn't have to necessarily be a registered NGO if you want to participate. And also civil society opened the door a little bit wider to non-state actors in the process. And they wanted to have their own declaration. Civil society felt states were not listening to them entirely. And they wanted to have a better influence on what was happening. And so the civil society was coming up with its own statements. They were frustrated with the state process. So they were coming up with their own statement. And it was a stronger, probably a stronger statement than the states eventually agreed to. But that's important. The role of non-states to put pressure on states is a very, very important role because if you leave states alone, they're going to go their own way. And if you ever listen to a report of a state about racism in their country, they will tell you, well, there's no racism, very little racism. And what we know is different. We know there's a lot of racism. And so that's why non-state actors have to be involved to keep the states honest or as honest as possible. When you remember the negotiations, were there highlight speeches that you remember? I remember seeing Castro giving a speech that went on for hours just off the top of his head about the history of racism actually connecting even with Taino and the European explorers first arriving. You touched upon that with the doctrine of discovery. And in 2001, there still wasn't the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which came later. Did you see how the World Conference of Racism was an important stepping stone to establish the recognition and move towards the reality of the rights of indigenous peoples? Absolutely. And in other situations, the UN was really, really struggling with the term Indigenous Peoples. That's why you had the working group on indigenous populations. You had the international idea that the world's indigenous people would know us. And then the decade of the world's indigenous people. The states were really reluctant to use the term peoples with an S because it implied rights under international law. And the states were resisting that. And so the indigenous people, at that time in 2001, were in the middle of negotiations of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. And so the World Conference was an opportunity to highlight the racism that indigenous people felt. And so we have fought very, very hard to get the term indigenous peoples used in the Declaration. And it does. It's there. It was, unfortunately, well, first of all, let's talk about the good stuff. They recognized that indigenous people were victims of racism, the racial superiority, discrimination, and that some of it was violent and some of it was subtle. It's, you know, the racism dispossessed and distributed on their lands and their language and their culture. There was a lot, a lot of recognition of the suffering of indigenous people because of racism. And so there was a lot of, you know, references to indigenous people in the Declaration. That's the good part. All right. However, and people would say, well, wow, so first declaration using the term indigenous peoples that you went and produced. However, paragraph 24 in that declaration states that the term indigenous peoples in this declaration does not imply rights under international law. And that was a racist and discriminatory paragraph in that document that was against racism and discrimination. And it was embarrassing. You know, it was embarrassing for states to do that. But, you know, what they were telling us is that if you wanted to turn indigenous peoples in the text of the Declaration, there was so much resistance to that that they had to put, they had to agree to put paragraph 24 into sort of indigenous peoples can stay in the text. And I thought that was a weak argument, but anyway, that's what happened. States were telling us that there were tough negotiations by states who were still, were not recognized indigenous peoples as peoples. And the rationale was they were saying that the indigenous peoples as being, I guess, subject to the international law was unsettled law. That was the term they used, sort of unsettled law. This was 2001. This is the 21st century, you know, and states were still squabbling about indigenous people being equal to all other peoples. It's amazing. That's a resistance that indigenous people are facing. I think you can't, you know, it's such a capsule, you know, of racism that indigenous people thought. It gets me so angry. I really get mad at paragraph 24. And now that it means, and I'll let it, I'll let it stood for at that time. And even though a lot of good stuff in the declaration of fighting discrimination and racism against indigenous peoples, paragraph 24 sort of undermined all of that. In my mind, you know, it weakened it and it just showed how callous and what states can be. And I think it really gets to the essence of what you're describing of just equality, of equity, of recognizing the historical harms and then guaranteeing dignity for all future generations. And some of the languages you described is good, like paragraph 39, recognizing indigenous peoples being victims of discrimination for centuries and affirming that they're free and equal in dignity and rights. I mean, basic things in the UDHR, recognizing the value and diversity. What I thought was good, though, was they at least started to see that they discussed the aspect on the understanding of the connection with the environment. And of course, as we see the world, we find today with world on fire and multiple continents and tropical storms and hurricanes, devastating communities. Finally, that understanding that indigenous peoples always knew and maybe you could share that from the how to Nishone perspective, there's certain aspects on the show. And of course, contribution to the principles of democracy with Ben Franklin studying that, but also even that larger image of working and living as one with the world and the natural environment. One of the indigenous people went to the United Nations in 1977 and a famous meeting on the NGO conference about racism against indigenous peoples in the western hemisphere. One of the speeches that the Haudenosaunee made was there. Two of the United Nations was that who is speaking for the animals? Who is speaking for the birds? Who is speaking for the fish? Who is speaking for the trees and the plants? And all those things that come in the natural world, who is speaking for the natural world? And that's what indigenous people were bringing to the UDHR, the voice of the natural world because we are so close to the natural world and states are so far away from the natural world. And that's what we were bringing to. And we've probably been talking about environment and climate change. Why would anybody? Because we could see the destruction of what earth happening before us. And we had a greater understanding of the damage that was happening. So we were trying to contribute that to the Earth Summit in Brazil and in other places. And later on in the following year of the following Durban meeting in Johannesburg, you know, sustained development, we were giving those messages then and we're still giving it today. Today we're still giving those kind of speeches. And except now we're saying that, hey, you see, we were right all along and you wouldn't listen. And now they're starting to listen. Now indigenous people are having a greater say in the climate change discussions that we didn't have before. You know, the Paris Accord gave us a small little voice and we're making that voice bigger and bigger as much as we can. That was a greater say in mitigating climate change. So there's a lot. Racism and discrimination against indigenous peoples has set the world back. The world would have been better off if the world had continued to listen to people equally and respected our teachings, our philosophy, our science. And I think the world would be better off. And so we have to make up for that lost time. And we have to get in there again, keep banging on the door, you know, getting up with the door and getting inside and doing the best we can because it's not just non-indigenous people who are suffering. It's all right. We're suffering from climate change as well and the changing world. And we've got to end racism. One of the things I want to say to you is I'm sure the next question is going to be, do you think the German Declaration had an impact? I don't know. I think it did a lot of good things, but also I think there's a rise in racism today. You can see it. You can see it in the streets and some of the most developed countries in the world that there's been a rise in racism. And why is that? And I think there's a scramble out there about, I think, indirectly it's climate change because society is changing and they're struggling with that change and they're lashing out at minorities and people will look different than they do. And so I think the German Declaration has to be read and a plan of action has to be read in today's situation and has to be improved and changed or interpreted in a better way to try to combat racism because racism is on the rise and we're going to lose ground if the world isn't smart enough. Oh, it's so true and it is loss. It's not understanding the interconnectedness and in paragraph 43 they did say we recognize the special relationship Indigenous peoples have with the land as the basis for their spiritual, physical and cultural existence and encourage states wherever possible to ensure retaining ownership of the land. That's so essential because all the biodiversity is always on the land that's in Indigenous people's hands and that's essential as of course we're getting to the anniversary of that Stockholm summit where Indigenous peoples the Sami met with First Nations then that far where people realize that common positions. But the other point that really gets me thinking as you pointed it out it's that point of will the world listen. And I think there has been some gains in the sense of there also is mention of welcoming the decision to create the permit forum which just celebrated its 20th year so it's creating that institution. And then I know next month is the session of the UN Human Rights Council and that's important because the UN special operator on the situation of human rights and fundamental freedoms of Indigenous peoples well mandate will be reviewed. Why is it also important to continue this work from Durban every September when the UN Human Rights Council looks at those resolutions related to Indigenous peoples and how do people get involved? I remember Durban now as you talk about it like it was just yesterday we're running around with the samosas getting a snack because there's never enough time with the Superman S shirts to get Indigenous peoples written. How's that different when you go to Geneva annually to be able to get those strong resolutions to make sure that like you said we don't go backward but we build better and I love of course I used that how Nashone seven generations to anticipate the next question. Today like the Human Rights Council of course is responsible for the implementation of Durban Declaration and they have a separate meeting on that and I don't know what the question is I think it's in June but today the Human Rights Council is coming up in September. We have two sessions on the on Indigenous people one is the report of the special raptor tour on the rights of Indigenous people it has a shorter title these days and the one that was in the Durban Declaration and and then we have to have the MREC we have a report of the MREC when we have a panel and the panel discussion will be will be about COVID again but the most and those are important things to attend and important for Indigenous people to participate in. Of course we don't know if the meeting is going to be open we're hoping to find out tomorrow and whether if you can't get there you can put in written submissions and you might be able to get a chance to speak but the most important part of that like the outcome document of the World Conference the Durban Declaration the resolutions that come out of the Human Rights Council are important and and when I go to the somewhat people like other people as well myself and others we go early the MREC Council to to sit in on the negotiations on the resolution on Indigenous rights and that's important to be there to influence the actual text and and it's also an opportunity because in we are we're allowed into the negotiation states you know the the resolution is chaired by Mexico and Guatemala and Indigenous representatives are allowed in the room and we can speak you know we can speak in there and and we do and we have to and and it's also it's being present also influence the states and our our friends feel our friendly states quote unquote I mean quotes feel more involved in when we're there because you know to support them and the negative states feel a bit more uncomfortable you know because we're sitting there and if they want to say something that undermines our our rights or what we're asking for it makes it a bit harder for them to do that so it's important for us to to be there to be in the negotiations and also to lobby states you know to talk to states and I encourage people when they ever do to to to go to the UN meeting you know you fine can go to the meeting you can sit there you can you can make a big speech but it's also an opportunity to speak states at a high level you know to speak to ambassadors or the permanent representative at some level you can get better access to the states at the UN than you can at domestic and it's good for states who initially people have a hard time being able to stay at home you do it at the UN you know and you can open doors you can you can speak with them at the UN all of a sudden at the UN the next thing you know you're talking to them at home about those issues so there it's the United Nations offers opportunities not and it's not a big room you know it's what happens in the hallway the coffee shops you know in the streets you know it's it there's a lot of kinds of opportunities and you just have to know how to push the buttons and pull the levers to get the best out of it. Oh that's really good point so we appreciate those ABCs of advocacy and that's really what we have to look at in this world conferences we're very large we're commemorating 20 years ago but it's those meetings every year that really also make the changes that you're organizing around and when you look at the world conference against racism and you look at these decades I think one of the important points that also comes about you get me thinking about what comes up next and one of the exciting thing that's going to be tabled according to a meeting that just happened today in Geneva would be the right to a clean and healthy environment that's building on another repertoire it's very important work but the other one is supposed to be a special repertoire on climate change in human rights which Indigenous peoples have been lobbying for can you maybe share how these two developments next month at the Human Rights Council's 48 session would be a powerful addition? I think it would be I think anything these special repertoires have a very specific job and they are effective I mean a good repertoire it can be very effective and in shining light onto the issues like the rights of Indigenous peoples you know like environment you know like women's rights they all have very important roles and now one on human rights and environment is really important because it's you know some states and some what do you call those things environmental organizations or conservative organizations are you know trying to put these lands aside so that they don't get to protect the air or whatever like that but then they want to throw the Indigenous people out of those lands and so the human rights of Indigenous people have to have to be protected in those cases you know or again we're going to be double victims we're going to be victims of climate change and we're going to be victims of the mitigation of climate change and so that's why we have to be there we have to be present and we have to convince these special repertoires to protect Indigenous peoples and a special repertoire on human rights and climate changes or environment I can't remember the title exactly is important because we need that we need that people shine the light on our situation. Oh that's that's excellent and of course when we go back and remember those nine days to negotiations we also know then a couple days later began 9-11 and we know today of course Biden said he was ending the forever war but Kenneth as you remind us really the forever war has been with Indigenous peoples and not recognizing the inherent dignity of arriving here 500 years ago and not understanding the wisdom and continuously ignoring that knowledge that actually is essential for the survival of all humanity so that's probably the message that has to be heard and must be heard as we move forward. I just wonder kid they're they're saying that you know the US just ended this longest war has it I think the longest war America has is against Indigenous peoples and is is it over you know there are peace treaties with all of the Indigenous people and all and those treaties have they been honored you know you know I think the war against Indigenous people is still there a low intensity war against Indigenous peoples and the continuing occupation of the lands ignoring of those treaties that have international structure you know the treaties between Indigenous peoples and states are the same as any treaty anywhere else in the world and so the United States has to start recognizing that those violations that they have of international law in terms of people's interests you know rights and also what other is there is there a peace between Indigenous people in the United States and is there an ongoing war a low intensity war against Indigenous people I think the the war of Afghanistan is not the longest war yeah and and I think the war is still continuing with Indigenous people. Thank you Kenneth I agree and that's why you see NGOs still organizing we can see the U.S. Human Rights Network is usually very active in the UN we'll be hosting its next event starting tomorrow to then look at this important work and they're also commemorating one of the successes was creating that new actions around the murder of George Floyd to create a commission of inquiry to get the UN Human Rights Council to actually take action and we'll see what happens next with the national gathering that will take place starting tomorrow but we thank you Kenneth for coming and sharing with us a walk down that road of Durban and all that was able to be accomplished. Yeah there's so many more stories too but of course there was another time. That sounds good let's just do that for the next time we meet but thank you so much for joining us today and look forward to future meetings hopefully in Geneva in person. Thank you