Hundreds of delegates representing diverse Indigenous nations from across the globe have gathered at the United Nations headquarters in New York this week for the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII), the world’s most significant annual assembly dedicated to advancing the rights and well-being of Indigenous peoples. Their arrival, however, is set against a complex and increasingly hostile global backdrop, marked by an accelerating artificial intelligence boom driving unprecedented demand for raw materials from ancestral lands, stringent visa policies making it increasingly difficult for delegates from the Global South to attend, and the persistent, intertwined crises of climate change and green energy projects that frequently infringe upon Indigenous land rights and sovereignty.

The 2026 session of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues is acutely focused on the stark reality of survival amidst widespread conflict, articulated by its official theme: "Ensuring Indigenous Peoples’ health, including in the context of conflict." Experts and advocates underscore that Indigenous communities worldwide already grapple with profound health inequities, a direct legacy of colonialism, historical trauma, and the escalating impacts of climate change. These existing vulnerabilities are now critically compounded by armed conflicts and militarization, which not only risk widespread ecological degradation but also trigger further displacement of Indigenous peoples from their ancestral territories, severing their deep spiritual and material ties to the land. For Indigenous peoples, health is understood holistically, inextricably linked to the vitality of the environment, the security of their land, and the exercise of their sovereignty, rather than being confined to clinical discussions about medicine or public health interventions. Beyond the direct ravages of warfare, a growing concern among advocates is the intensive extraction of critical minerals – such as lithium, cobalt, and nickel – essential for the global green energy transition, which is frequently driving new waves of Indigenous rights violations and environmental destruction. In response, a long-standing call for climate financing to be made directly accessible to Indigenous communities, bypassing often inefficient or state-controlled intermediaries, is gaining renewed urgency. This direct funding mechanism is seen as crucial for empowering self-determined, culturally appropriate climate adaptation and mitigation strategies.

Before the substantive diplomatic conversations can even commence, many delegates face the formidable practical hurdle of restrictive visa policies, policies that were notably tightened during the previous U.S. administration and continue to pose significant barriers. Mariana Kiimi Ortiz Flores, a Na’uu Savi advocate from Mexico and an advocacy assistant at Cultural Survival, recounted the challenges her organization encountered. Last year, several Indigenous representatives from Africa, meticulously prepared to attend the forum, had their visa applications denied. This year, an Indigenous staff member from South America also faced a visa denial, highlighting a systemic issue. Flores emphasized that access to the United States is becoming progressively more difficult, not solely due to visa issues, but also because of a broader climate of insecurity. "People from the Global South, especially Indigenous peoples that have a certain look like brown skin and certain characteristics, we feel threatened because of the general climate of insecurity and hate speech against Latin people and Indigenous peoples," Flores stated, pointing to the emotional and psychological toll these policies exert. The chilling effect of such experiences was evident last year when Indigenous leaders from Bolivia, who attended the forum to protest mining on their traditional lands, ultimately withdrew after experiencing harassment from a political party leader from their home country. Coupled with health challenges exacerbated by their ongoing struggle, they have decided not to return. Flores lamented, "The forum is meant to be for Indigenous peoples, but we really felt that that’s not what’s happening anymore and that at the end of the day the states are the ones who have more power over our lives." She added that the relentless struggle to defend their land against extractive industries profoundly impacts these leaders "not only physically but also mentally, spiritually."

This comprehensive toll on Indigenous well-being forms a central focus of a pivotal report authored by Geoffrey Roth, a Standing Rock Sioux descendant, former vice chair of the Permanent Forum, and current board chair of the Indigenous Determinants of Health Alliance, an international Indigenous health advocacy nonprofit. Roth asserts that "You can’t separate human health from the health of the environment, or our culture or our language," underscoring the deeply holistic perspective through which Indigenous peoples understand health – encompassing spiritual, emotional, physical, and mental dimensions, all interwoven with their ancestral lands, cultural practices, and traditional languages. In his comprehensive report, Roth meticulously outlines the Indigenous determinants of health, ranging from crucial protective factors such as secure land tenure and robust governance authority that actively strengthen Indigenous well-being, to critical risk indicators like land dispossession, environmental degradation, and systemic exclusion from decision-making processes. Roth critically argues that the fragmented approaches to Indigenous health frequently adopted by the United Nations system and various state governments fundamentally fail to adequately address the complex health problems and their underlying systemic causes. For instance, biodiversity conservation policies that disregard or actively undermine Indigenous land rights often miss critical opportunities to restore traditional land tenure, which could simultaneously improve ecosystem outcomes and strengthen access to vital traditional foods and medicinal plants. Similarly, mental health interventions that overlook the profound impact of state-sanctioned Indigenous language erasure — a legacy of assimilationist policies like residential schools — fail to harness the immense potential for improving Indigenous mental well-being through robust language revitalization efforts, which reconnect individuals with their identity, history, and cultural resilience. "Indigenous health is not just about healthcare, it’s about land, culture, food systems and community," Roth eloquently summarized. The Coquille Indian Tribe in Oregon has commendably adopted the Indigenous determinants of health by ordinance, and Roth has been collaborating with them as chairman of their executive health board to integrate these determinants across all tribal agencies. He cites the example of elders participating in monthly fishing activities, noting, "They understand that when they take elders out on a monthly basis to do fishing activities, that is health for those elders. It’s continuing their tradition as Coquille people, and it improves the mental health, behavioral health of those elders that are able to participate in that, let alone the food they catch." Roth’s report also issues a strong call to the UN to formally recognize the invaluable role of Indigenous midwifery, a practice that has often been systematically banned or marginalized in favor of Western medical practices. This suppression frequently forces Indigenous women into conventional healthcare institutions where they regrettably encounter pervasive racism and "obstetric violence," including procedures performed without their informed consent. "Indigenous people have been doing this for thousands of years, not only midwifery, but also caring for the environment and caring for our culture and preserving these food systems," he affirmed, highlighting the enduring wisdom embedded in Indigenous traditional knowledge.

In a separate but equally critical report submitted to UNPFII, former Permanent Forum chair Hindou Oumarou Ibrahim, an Indigenous Mbororo woman from Chad, issues a stark warning about artificial intelligence acting as a double-edged sword for Indigenous communities globally. While she strongly urges governments to support Indigenous peoples in developing AI tools to revitalize endangered languages, meticulously monitor their ancestral territories, and preserve cultural heritage, she simultaneously cautions against an emerging era of "digital extractivism." This alarming trend sees generative AI systems and major tech companies actively scraping and appropriating Indigenous cultural content, including invaluable medicinal knowledge, traditional stories, intricate designs, and even sensitive genetic data, often without free, prior, and informed consent or any benefit-sharing mechanisms. Lydia Jennings, a citizen of the Pascua Yaqui Tribe (Yoeme) and Huichol (Wixárika) and an assistant professor of environmental studies at Dartmouth College, explained that her passionate advocacy for Indigenous data sovereignty — a burgeoning movement asserting that communities retain the inherent right to own and control their own data — was ignited by a troubling discovery. She observed a mining company extracting detailed information about Indigenous cultural practices from an environmental impact statement and subsequently using it on its public website to promote a controversial mining project. "That was very alarming to me," she recounted, questioning, "How much information do we share in efforts to protect our sacred homelands? And what are the ways that we can govern how and who uses that data?" Like Ibrahim, Jennings acknowledges AI’s potential as an opportunity for tribes, noting that some might consider hosting data centers or utilizing AI for language preservation or synthesizing complex information. However, she remains deeply wary of the extent to which AI systems may be co-opting Indigenous data without consent, as well as the severe environmental risks that massive data centers pose to tribal lands and precious water resources, particularly in arid regions where many Indigenous communities reside. "Who has the power and how do we redistribute that power?" she queried, emphasizing that AI "can be a tool to power and a tool to harm, but how do we choose to wield it?" Jennings highlighted a growing global movement dedicated to incorporating best practices of Indigenous data sovereignty across multiple levels, from academic research protocols to national and international policy frameworks, championing principles like OCAP (Ownership, Control, Access, Possession).

Another central focus of this year’s Permanent Forum is the escalating global climate crisis and its disproportionate impact on Indigenous nomadic peoples. A February report, specifically addressing nomadic communities, warned that rigid state borders and exclusionary "fortress conservation" models are severely curtailing the traditional mobility of pastoralists, hunter-gatherers, and seafarers. This restriction occurs precisely as these communities contend with the severe fallout of climate change and an increasing lack of access to their ancestral lands and waters, which are essential for their survival and cultural practices. The report’s authors argue compellingly that mobility is not merely a practice but a deliberate, knowledge-based climate adaptation strategy deeply embedded in Indigenous cultures, a strategy that state policymakers are actively undermining and erasing. Citing the poignant example of the Tuareg people in the Sahara Desert, the report illustrates that while the desert itself knows no borders, contemporary militarized frontiers increasingly restrict ancestral routes and critically undermine pastoral systems and access to vital services, effectively rendering these lived realities of Indigenous peoples invisible in official data and policy frameworks. This sentiment was powerfully echoed by Samante Anne, an Indigenous Maasai from Kenya, who recently spoke at a virtual panel on pastoralists’ legal rights on behalf of the Mainyoito Pastoralists Integrated Development Organization. Anne highlighted that while 60% of land in Kenya is communally owned, it is increasingly being subdivided for commercial developments and claimed for carbon offset projects, which severely limit pastoralists’ access to vital grazing lands and their traditional migratory movements. "Mobility has everything to do with us adapting to climate change," Anne asserted. "Mobility has everything to do with ensuring our livelihoods are secure, our food security is good."

Making substantive progress on complex issues such as Indigenous health, the ethical implications of artificial intelligence, and the protection of territorial rights is further complicated by a persistent and problematic trend within the United Nations system: the conflation of Indigenous peoples with "local communities." In numerous official policies, initiatives, and even funding mechanisms, the two distinct groups are frequently merged under the acronym "IPLCs" — Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities. However, while "local communities" represent a broad and diverse category of stakeholders, Indigenous peoples hold distinct, legally recognized collective rights under international law, most notably enshrined in the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP). Geoffrey Roth from the Indigenous Determinants of Health Alliance recounted challenging this issue directly at the World Health Organization when the agency categorized an Indigenous initiative merely as an "equity" issue. "This is not an equity issue," Roth recalled telling the agency. "We are not just another one of your minority populations. We are rights holders, and this needs to be approached from a rights-based approach." He stressed that "conflating us with other populations really diminishes our rights and diminishes our ability to maintain our health in our communities." Roth pointed to the UN Convention on Biological Diversity’s IPLC working group as a prime example of how this grouping actively hinders meaningful Indigenous participation. "I’ve tried to participate in that group several times, and as an Indigenous person, I don’t feel welcome and I’m not able to participate," he said. "These (IPLC) institutions are a way to lessen or dilute the voice of Indigenous peoples in these global mechanisms, and that, to me, is unacceptable." Roth is far from alone in this sentiment. In 2023, the UN’s three preeminent Indigenous rights bodies – the Permanent Forum itself, the Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples – issued a powerful joint statement unequivocally demanding that UN environmental treaties cease using the IPLC acronym entirely. They emphatically declared, "Indigenous Peoples should not be grouped with an undefined set of communities that may have very different rights and interests," underscoring the legal and political imperative of distinct recognition.

For advocates working tirelessly on the ground, this ongoing debate about terminology and recognition is merely one facet of a growing sense of disillusionment with the effectiveness and accountability of the UN system itself. Mariana Kiimi Ortiz Flores of Cultural Survival observed that the United Nations, as an international institution, has seen a discernible decline in its influence and power, largely due to the consistent willingness of member states to simply disregard its foundational laws and declarations. Despite the bureaucratic hurdles, the disheartening visa denials, and the pervasive geopolitical hostility, Flores expressed that she is among the countless Indigenous peoples who remain resolute in their determination to show up this week and every week. "If we as Indigenous peoples don’t do it," Flores asserted, "No one else will speak for us and defend us." This unwavering commitment underscores the profound importance of their presence on the global stage, advocating for their inherent rights, preserving their cultures, and safeguarding their ancestral lands for future generations, even as they navigate an increasingly challenging international landscape.