UN rights office lauds ruling on Indigenous Peoples’ land claims in Brazil

Anjali Sharma

GG News Bureau

UNITED NATIONS , 27th Sept. UN human rights office on Tuesday encouraged a Brazilian Supreme Court ruling in favor of a land rights case brought by Indigenous Peoples.

OHCHR said that the landmark decision rejected time restrictions on Indigenous People’s claims to their ancestral land and called it “very encouraging”.

The opposing legal argument would have blocked Indigenous Peoples who were not living on their ancestral land 35 years ago from laying claim to it today; 1988 was the year when Brazil’s constitution was adopted.

OHCHR said that such limits would have “perpetuated and aggravated historic injustices suffered by Brazil´s Indigenous Peoples”.

UN rights office said that it is concerned that a draft bill being discussed in Congress was seeking to impose the 1988 deadline which has now been rejected by the Supreme Court.