KATRIBU Solidarity message for the 40th Anniversary of The Indigenous World

Solidarity Message from KATRIBU

40th Anniversary of The Indigenous World

July 11, 2026 | Bangkok, Thailand

by Beverly L. Longid

KATRIBU National Convener

Gawis ay agew ken datayo amin. A pleasant day to all of us.

On behalf of KATRIBU, it is a great honor and privilege to join you in celebrating The Indigenous World’s 40^th anniversary. We extend our warmest congratulations to the International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs (IWGIA) for reaching this remarkable milestone.

For four decades, The Indigenous World has been much more than an annual publication. It has been a living record of the struggles, resilience, aspirations, and victories of Indigenous Peoples across the world. Since its first edition in 1986, it has accompanied Indigenous Peoples in documenting our realities and asserting our rights in the face of continuing dispossession, discrimination, violence, and exclusion.

What makes The Indigenous World particularly important is that it does not simply tell stories about Indigenous Peoples. It creates space for Indigenous Peoples to speak for ourselves, to document our own realities, analyses, experiences, and aspirations. In doing so, it helps ensure that our histories are not written without us, our struggles are not erased, and our contributions are not forgotten.

For KATRIBU, this is especially significant. The Indigenous World has documented not only individual country situations, but also the development of the global Indigenous Peoples’ movement, our growing engagement with international human rights mechanisms, including the United Nations, and our continuing struggle for recognition of our collective rights, self-determination, and dignity.

It has recorded how Indigenous Peoples have moved from being largely excluded from international decision-making spaces to becoming recognized actors in shaping global debates on human rights, climate change, biodiversity, development, and peace. This progress did not come simply because institutions opened their doors. It was won through decades of organizing, resistance, advocacy, solidarity, and collective action by Indigenous Peoples themselves.

At a time when misinformation and disinformation increasingly threaten truth, and when Indigenous communities continue to face attempts to erase our histories, question our identities, and undermine our rights, The Indigenous World remains an important source of knowledge, evidence, and accountability.

Documentation, therefore, is not merely about preserving history. It is an act of resistance. It is a way of defending truth, affirming identity, protecting rights, and ensuring that the Indigenous Peoples’ experiences and contributions cannot simply be distorted or erased.

But The Indigenous World also reminds us of something fundamental: Indigenous Peoples are not merely subjects of history. We are makers of history.

For generations, our peoples have defended our territories, protected forests and rivers, sustained biodiversity, preserved languages and knowledge systems, and cared for the Earth. We are farmers who feed communities, fisherfolk who sustain coastal life, forest stewards who protect ecosystems, workers who contribute to economies, and knowledge holders whose practices continue to offer pathways for addressing the global crises we face today.

Our presence in international spaces is a continuation of these struggles.

We do not engage internationally just to be included or represented. We engage because we are peoples with distinct identities, cultures, governance systems, territories, and inherent rights. We are not merely communities affected by decisions made by governments, corporations, or international institutions. We are rights holders, decision-makers, and active participants in shaping the future of our societies and our planet.

Our international engagement allows us to bring the realities of our communities to global attention, from land dispossession and extractive industries to militarization, criminalization, climate change, and attacks on Indigenous human rights defenders. At the same time, we bring forward the knowledge, values, governance systems, and solutions that our peoples have developed and sustained over generations.

But we must also remember that international advocacy is only as strong as the movements and communities that sustain it on the ground. Our global voice comes from the organizing, resistance, and collective action of our peoples. The strength of what we say in international spaces is rooted in the struggles and aspirations of our communities.

This is also where we see the value of IWGIA’s relationship with Indigenous Peoples’ organizations and movements.

The solidarity between IWGIA and Indigenous Peoples has never been simply about producing publications. It has been built through trust, mutual respect, equality, partnership, and a shared commitment to justice and human rights. Over the decades, this relationship has accompanied Indigenous Peoples through important moments in the development of the global movement and helped ensure that our realities and voices reach wider audiences and international decision-making spaces.

Therefore, this 40th anniversary is not only a celebration of a publication. It is a celebration of four decades of Indigenous Peoples’ voices, struggles, resistance, and achievements being documented and carried into the global arena. It is also a celebration of solidarity that has endured because it is grounded in shared values and common struggles.

As we celebrate 40 years, we also look toward the future.

The challenges confronting Indigenous Peoples remain immense. Across regions, our territories continue to be targeted for mining, energy projects, infrastructure, agribusiness, and other forms of resource extraction. Militarization and criminalization continue to threaten communities and Indigenous Peoples human rights defenders. Climate and biodiversity policies increasingly recognize Indigenous Peoples’ contributions, while at the same time threatening to appropriate our lands and knowledge in the name of the so-called green transition.

In this context, we need documentation that does more than record violations. We need knowledge that strengthens organizing, supports resistance, informs advocacy, and holds states, corporations, and institutions accountable.

We need to continue documenting not only what is being done to Indigenous Peoples, but also what Indigenous Peoples are doing: how we organize, resist, govern our territories, defend our lands, protect biodiversity, sustain our communities, and build alternatives grounded in justice and self-determination.

This is the continuing importance of The Indigenous World.

May the next decades continue to be shaped by Indigenous Peoples’ own voices and leadership. May it continue to connect our local struggles with regional and global movements. And may it continue to remind the world that Indigenous Peoples are not obstacles to development or vulnerable groups waiting to be protected.

We are peoples. We are rights holders. We are contributors, partners, and leaders in building a just and sustainable future.

To IWGIA, thank you for walking with us for these 40 years: for documenting our struggles, amplifying our voices, and standing in solidarity with Indigenous Peoples across generations.

Congratulations on 40 years of The Indigenous World.

May it continue to inform, inspire, challenge, and strengthen the global Indigenous Peoples’ movement, and may the next chapters continue to be written with Indigenous Peoples, by Indigenous Peoples, and in the service of our collective struggle for justice, dignity, self-determination, and the protection of our peoples and territories.

Thank you.