Indigenous human rights: what the UN’s approach is missing

At the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, the repression of Indigenous Peoples is on the agenda – but indigenous voices still need more space to tell their stories of it, write Yana Tannagasheva and Olga Kostrova.

“So, how do you say ‘land’ in Chulym?”

“Chär. And in Shor?”

“For us, it’s Cher.”

“Shor and Chulym are very similar.”

Land. *Chär*. *Cher* – that which binds us all together. Indigenous Peoples in Russia are being deprived of their own land.

We – two Indigenous women from Western Siberia – recently found ourselves conversing about the word “land” in our language in a United Nations hall during a break between sessions. One of us, Olga Kostrova, is a Chulym woman from the Tomsk region; the other, Yana Tannagasheva, is a Shor woman from the Kemerovo region. We were both forced to leave our native lands – as Indigenous activists and human rights defenders, we fled Russia at different times due to persecution and threats from the Russian authorities.

A few days ago, we participated in a session of the UN Human Rights Council to inform the global community about the grave rights violations facing our Indigenous Peoples – and, above all, the repression against our Indigenous sisters who were arrested in Moscow in December 2025 on terrorism chargesExternal link.

We frequently take part in international processes and arrived in Geneva full of hope. The procedure is always the same: pre-registration, activating electronic badges, passing through security to enter the UN complex, walking into the meeting hall. Of course, the Human Rights Council is different to other sessions. Here, country representatives take up almost the entire hall, and the bulk of the time is allocated to them; civil society and Indigenous Peoples are left whatever time remains at the end. Despite the fact that we are the key indicators of how human rights protections are actually implemented on the ground, we remain largely invisible. This creates a sense of limitation regarding the ability to fully participate in Human Rights Council sessions.

Hurdles to greater UN participation

The Human Rights Council faces a significant limitation: registering and actively participating in all sessions requires an Indigenous organisation to hold consultative status with the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) – a status that demands immense financial and time resources to obtain. Indigenous Peoples’ rights are violated daily and criminalisation is intensifying; this situation calls for a rapid response and unhindered communication.

There are only 382 of us Chulyms left. The majority live in the Tomsk region. We are deprived of the opportunity to lead our traditional way of life – specifically, hunting without a permit – because we lack officially designated “territories of traditional nature use”. Furthermore, the Ob River, contaminated with mercury, poses a serious threat to the health of the Indigenous Peoples in the area.

In Shoria – the homeland of the Shor people, who number just over 10,000 – Yana often accompanied her father into the taiga to gather cedar nuts. For the Shor, cedar nuts are a gift from the taiga; they have sustained Shor people for centuries and bound us to our land. For Indigenous Peoples, the land represents roots, traditions, and the connection between generations. Today, Russian authorities are attempting to sever this bond – barbaric coal mining is destroying the traditional territories of the Shor people.

The Indigenous Peoples of the Russian North are among the country’s smallest and most vulnerable population groups. Russia is a multi-ethnic nation home to over 190 ethnic groups. Their total population is approximately 265,000 – less than 0.2% of Russia’s total population.

Indigenous Peoples in Russia

Russian law officially recognizes only 47 “Indigenous Small-Numbered Peoples”, 40 of whom are classified as Indigenous Small-Numbered Peoples of the North, Siberia, and the Far East. These peoples – including the Nenets, Evenks, Khanty, Mansi, Chukchi, Sami, Shor, Selkup, Dolgan, and Chulym, among many others – have historically inhabited vast territories stretching from the Kola Peninsula to Chukotka.

Land. *Chär*. *Cher* – that which binds us all together.It is precisely within the territories of the Indigenous Peoples of the North, Siberia, and the Far East that vast reserves of oil, gas, coal, gold, and other minerals are concentrated, and where large-scale extractive and energy projects are implemented. The traditional lands of Indigenous Peoples constantly lie at the intersection of competing interests: for the state and business, they are primarily a source of natural resources, whereas for Indigenous Peoples, they are ancestral lands – the source of their life, culture, and the future of generations to come. We participate in international processes to speak about these issues, draw attention to our challenges, and seek assistance and protection. Yet, sometimes, such participation can lead to imprisonment.

Daria Egereva, a Selkup woman from the Tomsk region and co-chair of the International Indigenous Peoples’ Forum on Climate Change (IIPFCC)External link, has participated in global human rights mechanisms concerning Indigenous Peoples. On December 17, 2025, upon returning from UN climate talks in Brazil, she was detainedExternal link and has remained in prison for over nine months. That same month, authorities also visited the Moscow home of another Indigenous rights defender, Natalia Leongardt, who has advocated for Indigenous rights for more than 20 years. Russia seeks to imprison our sisters for 20 years for entirely peaceful civic activism – activities it labels as “extremism and terrorism”. Russia is criminalising the very defense of Indigenous rights, silencing independent voices, and isolating Indigenous communities from international support.

At the recent session of the Human Rights Council in Geneva, Mariana Katzarova, the Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Russian Federation, presented a report on Russia’s transnational repressionExternal link. Such repression, according to the report, is “a comparatively low-cost, high-impact state instrument that reinforces domestic repression and undermines activism, dissent, independent media and civil society in exile, targeting the willingness of victims of repression to engage with foreign governments and international human rights mechanisms”.

Land. *Chär*. *Cher* – that which binds us all together. Indigenous Peoples in Russia are being deprived of their own land.Yet even those forced to leave their homes and travel thousands of kilometers away remain targets of Russian authorities seeking to control, silence, and intimidate them. But distance does not make us any less Indigenous. Borders do not erase our memory, and exile does not strip us of our right to speak. And as long as we are able, we will continue to speak – about our land, our rights, and those currently in custody. We will speak so that our Indigenous sisters, Daria and Natalia, may gain their freedom. So that our peoples may live in peace on their own land. Even in the darkest of times, we must keep hope alive.

So we ask you to not let us vanish unnoticed. We ask you to speak up for our peoples – and thereby help Daria and Natalia to be free.

Edited by Benjamin von Wyl/dos