Right Livelihood, Centro por la Justicia y el Derecho Internacional and the Red de Defensoras Indígenas delivered a joint statement at the 54th session of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. The statement called attention to the ongoing humanitarian crisis among Indigenous Peoples living on the Caribbean Coast of Nicaragua in light of a recent UN report detailing the Nicaraguan military’s increased presence in Indigenous communities.
You can read the entire statement here.
Settlers in Nicaragua continue to use genocidal practices against Indigenous communities, including forced displacements, armed attacks, rape and murder. Amounting to a humanitarian crisis, there have been four times as many violent attacks in 2023 as there were in 2022, and there are still three months left in the year.
The perpetrators of these crimes enjoy complete impunity, we told the Council. Rather than seek justice for Indigenous Peoples, the Nicaraguan government promotes cohabitation with illegal settlers, sells Indigenous land to third parties, and as reported by the UN’s Expert Mechanism on Indigenous Peoples, increases the military’s presence in these communities.
If the Nicaraguan government continues to be complicit in these attacks, the country’s Indigenous communities will be wiped out, we told the Council.
To put an end to this humanitarian crisis, and ensure the survival of Nicaragua’s Indigenous Peoples, we called on the Council to demand Nicaragua follows its national and international human rights obligations and upholds Indigenous Peoples’ territorial rights.
We also asked the Council to press Nicaragua to immediately remove armed settlers from indigenous territories and to carry out fair, independent investigations into all violations committed.
