Local indigenous groups laud gov't on support of UN rights declaration

http://www.stabroeknews.com/index.pl/article?id=56528851

Local indigenous groups laud gov't on support of UN rights declaration
Stabroek News,
Saturday, September 15th 2007

The Amerindian Peoples Association (APA) and the Guyanese Organisation
of Indigenous Peoples (GOIP) have commended the Guyana government for
voting in favour of the adoption of the Declaration on the Rights of
Indigenous People at the UN General Assembly in New York on Thursday.

In a joint press release issued yesterday, the two organisations said
they were "extremely elated, as must be the majority of Indigenous
Peoples throughout Guyana with the adoption of the declaration which
sets the minimum standards pertaining to the rights of indigenous
peoples that the state of Guyana should abide with."

They quoted Chair of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues,
Victoria Tauli-Corpuz in her address to the UN on the adoption of the
declaration as stating that the declaration "sets the minimum
international standards for the protection and promotion of the rights
of indigenous peoples. Therefore existing and future laws, policies and
programmes on indigenous peoples will have to be redesigned and shaped
to be consistent with this standard."

In August, the Guyana government had expressed reservations about
certain sections of the declaration.

This had led to a last-minute insertion, which Cabinet Secretary Dr
Roger Luncheon told the media yesterday would have been responsible for
Guyana supporting the adoption of the motion.