UN SUBCOMMISSION/INDIGENOUS PEOPLES: THE TRANSNATIONAL RADICAL PARTY URGES THE ADOPTION OF THE DECLARATION AS IT STANDS.

Geneva, 17 August, 1999. The Transnational Radical Party, taking the floor again at the 51st session of the UN Subcommission on Minorities, has welcome the final working paper on indigenous peoples and their relationship to land and stressed the importance of the review of the activities undertaken so far in the framework of the Decade of the World's Indigenous People in order to identify obstacles to achievement of the goals of the Decade, in particular in the area of the relationship of the

indigenous people to land.

Olga Cechurova of the Transnational Radical Party consentrated on the situation of indigenous people of West Papua. "Since 1963, when the New York Agreement between Indonesia and the Netherlands was signed under the auspices of the UN and later the Act of Free Choice was manipulated in 1969, West Papuans have been subjected to most unprecedented human rights violations, including indiscriminate shooting, summary killing, destruction of property, intimidation, arbitrary detention and disappearances", she stressed and described three main aspects of indigenous land rights violation in West Papua: mining and logging activities and transmigration.

Ms. Cechurova expressed the view of the Transnational Radical Party that it is imperatively important for the UN bodies, starting with the Sub-Commission and the Commission, to urge all the Governments to find and implement means of giving indigenous peoples greater responsibility for their own affairs and an effective voice in decisions on matters which affect them, as suggested by the Commission's resolution 1999/51.

"Furthermore, we call upon this Sub-Commission to promote a process of encouraging continual and genuine dialogue between the Governments and indigenous peoples, in general as well as in concrete cases such as West Papua. Finally, the Transnational Radical Party calls for the adoption of the Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as it stands", she concluded.

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