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Sweden: Sami struggle over land rights
January 2007
The indigenous Sami people in northern Sweden took a step toward self-determination in the New Year, when the government gave them full control of reindeer herding for the first time.
 Read the article on Reuters
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USA: Cherokee Nation members revoke membership of freedmen
March 2007
Cherokee Nation members have voted to revoke the tribal citizenship of an estimated 2,800 descendants of the people the Cherokee Indians once owned as slaves.
Read the articles
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Alaska: High suicide rate among Alaska Natives continues
April 2007
A new report shows that suicides among Alaska Natives continue at rates far higher than the national average despite two decades of effort by state and community leaders.
Read the article
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Canada: Bureacrats urge government to back UN Declaration on Indigenous Rights
June 2007
Amnesty International has obtained documents through access-to-information legislation that show officials within the Canadian departments of Indian Affairs, Foreign Affairs and Defence have all recommended that the government back the UN statement of aboriginal rights. A declaration that Canada is now lobbying the UN to revisit and revise.
Read the The Globe and Mail article online (web link)
Read more about the Declaration on this website
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Canada: aboriginal day of action on Friday 29 June
June 2007
The Assembly of First Nations in Canada has designated Friday June 29 as a National Day of Action to draw attention to the issues facing Canada's aboriginal communities, including poverty, soaring high school dropout rates, high suicide rates and unresolved land claims.
Read the coverage in cbcnews online (web link)
Read more about the National Day of Action at the Assembly of First Nations' web site
Read Kenneth Deer's Why I support the aboriginal National Day of Action on the Gazette Online
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Canada: The Cree Nation of Ottawa assumes greater authority in the development of their nation
July 2007
After three years of intense negotiations, the Cree Nation in Canada has reached a significant financial agreement with Ottawa's federal government. Under the agreement, the Cree will take over the administration of justice, including rehab centres, workhouses and refuges for women; training and manpower; construction of community centres, sewage systems and firefighting services; and economic development programs.
Read The Gazette's on-line article on the deal (web link)
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Canada: Amnesty urges halt to logging on indigenous land
September 2007
In a report released this month, Amnesty International Canada urges the government of Ontario, Canada, to halt logging on the indigenous Grassy Narrows community's land.
Read about the report and the Grassy Narrows logging dispute on Environment News Service's website
Download Amnesty International Canada's public briefing on the conflict over logging at Grassy Narrows (pdf)
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Canada: Canadian natives discriminated in prisons
October 2007
Fourty persent of Canada's aboriginal population live in poverty (for the country as a whole, the figure is fifteen percent). They also live shorter, and are more likely to come from single-parent homes, than non-aboriginals. They account for around 3 percent of the counytry's population - but twenty percent of the prison inmates. A new report of the correctional service investigator, which will be published soon, is expected to highlight aboriginal issues in line with last year's report, that was highly critical towards the racism within the Canadian prison system.
Read Reuters Canada's story online (web link)
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Canada: Climate change threatens First Nations' forests
December 2007
Dave Porter, a Native leader from British Columbia in Canada, has travelled to Bali to take part in the World Summit on Climate Change, and give a speech on the immediate threat to the forests of his homeland: British Columbia is experiencing an invasion of pine beetles this year - a bug that threatens to kill 10 million hectares of lodgepole pine, and thus put 103 First Nations, who depend on the forest, at risk. The beetle epidemic, which is caused by warmer winters, is one of the worst disasters ever exerienced in Canada, according to Porter.
Read Canada East online's story (web link)
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