By LiCAS.news
THAILAND – The global transition to renewable energy is increasing pressure on Indigenous lands and risks repeating extractive abuses unless affected communities participate meaningfully in decisions and consent to projects, the United Nations human rights chief warned.
Volker Türk, the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, said growing demand for critical minerals, renewable energy infrastructure and large-scale development projects was placing Indigenous territories and resources under mounting pressure.
“The world’s transition to a greener economy is essential – and it cannot come at the expense of the rights of Indigenous Peoples,” Türk said Jul 15 during the 19th session of the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples in Geneva.
“There must be a just transition, firmly grounded in human rights, meaningful participation, and consent to all projects affecting their territories and resources,” he said.
Türk said mining and extractive activities, deforestation and large-scale agriculture continued to exploit and destroy Indigenous lands and territories without the consent of their communities.
He also warned that Indigenous environmental defenders, including women and young people, faced widespread intimidation, criminalization, harassment and violence for protecting their lands and ecosystems.
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