Indigenous people in the Arctic suffer under climate change

Göttingen
In the whole of the Arctic the indigenous people are already confronted with the catastrophic consequences of the climate change. The results of the warming of the climate affect the safety on their roads and in their towns. They threaten to destroy their health and means of subsistence as well as their cultures and ways of life. There are almost four million people living in the Arctic, and their land goes across the northern polar circle through Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Island, Canada, Russia and the USA. 400,000 of them belong to more than 30 indigenous peoples like the Saami in Lapland, the Inuit in Greenland, the Gwich’in, Ahabasks and Yup’ik in Alaska or the Evenks in Siberia. The indigenous people have exact knowledge on their environment, marked by permafrost, the ice of which in many places has not land, but the Arctic Ocean underneath. Today they are observing throughout the Arctic big changes in the weather and environment. They notice that the winters are getting shorter and warmer, that the glaciers are retreating or completely thawing and that the ice cover is getting thinner. The rise in temperature in the Arctic is taking place twice or three times faster than the global average. This is mainly due to the carbon-dioxide in the atmosphere, which develops with the burning of fossil energy producers like oil and coal. Indigenous people in the Arctic have had to struggle for decades against the mining of oil and gas and their immediate consequences for their health and environment. Now the results of global oil-mining and other industrial activities place them before an even greater and until now unknown challenge. The indigenous people have known for generations how to adjust to an extreme environment. How can they now react to the catastrophic results of the warming-up of the climate, which is threatening to take away their means of subsistence? The speed with which change is taking place in the light of the global power balance makes it difficult to adjust to the changed conditions. The climate change is for the indigenous people a form of human rights infringement, appearing in all reaches of life and threatening to destroy the basis for their survival. The power of nature is destroying roads and towns Roads which were in the past well-known between towns and into hunting-grounds and leading over ice have now become dangerous on account of the thin ice-covering, which is full of cracks. In the Canadian autonomous region of Nunavut deaths have already occurred when Inuit who have been hunting and fishing have fallen through the ice, which had become too thin. For the 600 Inupiat in Shismaref in Alaska the effect of the climate change is literally tearing the ground from under their feet. They see themselves forced to leave their town on the island which has been inhabited for 4000 years off the coast of Alaska within the next few years. The rising temperatures cause storms at sea and erosion of the coast in Shishmaref. The sea ice is disappearing and the frozen permafrost floor is steadily melting. So houses, water-pipes and other parts of the infrastructure have been destroyed. One end of an Inupiat village was completely washed away by a storm. 184 other communities in Alasky are at present threatened by the danger of erosion and flooding. Basis of subsistence in danger As in other parts of the Arctic also the inhabitants of Shishmaref are concerned about their supply of food. Through the disappearing sea-ice they can no longer get over the ice to land at the beginning of November in order to hunt elks and caribous. The bay has become an open stretch of water. But it is not only this approach to food which is worrying indigenous people, who are dependent on hunting ice-bears, walruses, seals and caribous, on keeping reindeer and on fishing and collecting. Under the new conditions many animals are changing their migration movements. Animal populations are becoming smaller and are threatening to die out. In the same way many sources of plant food are being lost, since for example berries cannot grow any longer in the changed climate. Species of insects, birds and fish are appearing which were previously unknown. Seals, ice-bears and walruses, for which ice is necessary as a habitat, are threatened with extinction. The Yup’ik are reporting that in Alaska the melting of the ice is decreasing the habitat of the walruses, which is urgently needed by them for their sustenance and the upbringing of their young. Cultural identity threatened The flora and fauna are needed not just as a source of sustenance for the survival of the indigenous people. They are also important for their social, cultural and spiritual identity. Festivals, ceremonies, mythologies and traditional stories reflect the meaning of the Arctic environment for its inhabitants. So the climate change is now putting the survival of the Inuit culture at risk. They see their human right of deciding their own way of life severely infringed. Danger to health The food situation results in a lack of food and to a change in nutritional habits. So illnesses are becoming more prevalent among indigenous people. Health and well-being are being affected by increased ultra-violet rays. The sun has become more aggressive, sun-burn and other unknown skin diseases are becoming more prevalent. The climate change is also resulting in new infectious diseases. Indigenous organisations active against climate change From the Saami in Lappland to the Evenks in Siberia and the Yup’ik and Gwich’ in in Alsaka to the Inuit in Greenland the indigenous people are fighting together over three continents against the threat to their existence from the climate change. In organisations like the Circumpolar Conference of the Inuit, the Saami Council, the Russian RAIPON and the Inuit Tapirit Kanatami the Arctic peoples are drawing the attention of the whole world to the acute danger of their situation. So delegates of the indigenous organisations visited Brussels in May 2005 to appeal to the EU countries to take measures against the climate change and provide assistance for the Arctic peoples. The chairperson of the Inuit Circumpolar Conference, Sheila Watt-Cloutier, emphasises that the Inuit certainly do not see themselves as powerless victims. In fact she frequently speaks up in front of an international audience to demand a greater say of the indigenous peoples in political decision-making and more conscious climate policies. Recently the Inuit handed in a petition signed by 63 Inuit from Canada and Alaska to the UN Climate Conference from 28.11.2005 to 9.12.2005 in Canadian Montreal of the Inter-American Commission for Human Rights (IACHR). In it they refer to the USA as chiefly responsible for the climate collapse, as this country with over 25% has the greatest emission of poisonous gases and at the same time refuses to sign the Kyoto Protocol or to take other measures. In this way it poses a direct threat to the survival of the Inuit culture. At the Inter-American Commission for Human Rights the Inuit are hoping to find support against the infringements of human rights committed by the USA against the Inuit by the climate change. The idea is that they investigate the effects of the climate change on the Inuit and establish whether the US government with its climate policies is infringing the „American Declaration on the Rights and Duties of Man” and other agreements of international law. If the IAHCR decides in favour of the Inuit they could then as the next step apply for a formal hearing at the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. The Inuit want in this way to bring the USA to cooperate at last with the international community and to reduce as soon as possible and effectively their emissions of green-house gases in the framework of the UN Climate Convention. The culture and resources of the Inuit must be protected by a plan which takes account of land, water, snow, fauna and flora. The USA must also cooperate with the Inuit to avoid irreparable damage. „In this petition it is not a matter of money,” said the chairperson of the !CC, Sheila Watt-Cloutier in her speech, „it is rather a matter of encouraging the USA to join the international community and to agree to a significant reduction of the emission of green-house gases, which is necessary for the Arctic environment, for the Inuit culture and lastly for the whole world…We are not presenting the petition in a spirit of confrontation – that is not the way of the Inuit – but in order to invite the USA to a dialogue in the framework of the Climate Convention… I invite the USA to give a positive reply to our petition. I also invite the governmental and non-governmental organisations throughout the world to support our petition and not to forget that the climate change is finally a matter of human rights.” While the indigenous groups of the Arctic have been earliest and most severely affected by the consequences of the climate change, they bear at the same time only small responsibility for its causes. Thus they have little influence on the causes and processes of the climate change and on the consequences which they have had to draw urgently from its already catastrophic results. They are in most cases excluded from the important decision-making processes. Indigenous organisations are asking us to speak up on their behalf It is above all governments, companies, employers’ organisations and the peoples of the industrial countries from which responsible action is urgently needed. It is vitally necessary by reducing the amount of carbon-dioxide in the atmosphere to slow down the ever-increasing climate change and to limit its extent. At the same time everything possible must be done to react more effectively to the changes which have already taken place.

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