44-1 Crossing False Borders: Indigenous Movement and Forced Migration

By Alianza Indígena Sin Fronteras, International Mayan League, and Indigenous Languages Office

 

The late Tongan-Fijian scholar Epeli Hau’ofa famously reframed previously held notions of the Pacific from small dots inconsequentially punctuating an endless blue map, to, instead, a vast sea of islands: Oceania. Within the subregion of so-called Polynesia, Tuvalu exemplifies both notions; a nation both small and vast, with just over 11,000 citizens existing in communities across 8 low-lying coral islands and atolls: Funafuti, Nukufetau, Vaitupu, Nui, Nanumanga, Nanumea, Niutao, and Nukulaelae.

 

Angela, a 75-year-old Wayúu woman, with her husky voice and slow steps, runs through the courtyards of her new shelter made up of plastic bags and zinc sheets that she, her family, and neighbors call her new home. It has been more than two years since they came to the ranchería that they named Perra’a (or Vera, a common tree in the mountains of La Guajira). This small refuge is located a few kilometers from Paraguachon on the road to Maicao, Colombia.

 

Eastern Siberia and its world famous Lake Baikal region, which is roughly the size of France, represents not only a cross-border zone between nations, but an ecological transition zone where the high, cold, grassland steppe country of Mongolia is interspersed with the southern range of taiga of Eastern Siberia, Russia. For thousands of years, long before the Russian state and its domination of Siberia and the reach of the Mongolian

 

This article was written in collaboration with the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee as part of a series highlighting the resilience, wisdom, and power of Indigenous communities as they face the climate crisis.  

 

Countless Indigenous Peoples have been divided by imposed State borders, their communities and relatives separated by artificial lines, their migration patterns, sacred rituals, fishing and hunting ways altered. Innumerable Indigenous communities have suffered forced displacement due to conservation efforts, extractive industry operations, political strife, and the impacts of climate change. Every day we hear about Indigenous migrants who are forced to leave their home in search of work because it is no longer viable for them to make a living locally.

 

Countless Indigenous Peoples have been divided by imposed State borders, their communities and relatives separated by artificial lines, their migration patterns, sacred rituals, fishing and hunting ways altered. Innumerable Indigenous communities have suffered forced displacement due to conservation efforts, extractive industry operations, political strife, and the impacts of climate change. Every day we hear about Indigenous migrants who are forced to leave their home in search of work because it is no longer viable for them to make a living locally.

 

Countless Indigenous Peoples have been divided by imposed State borders, their communities and relatives separated by artificial lines, their migration patterns, sacred rituals, fishing and hunting ways altered. Innumerable Indigenous communities have suffered forced displacement due to conservation efforts, extractive industry operations, political strife, and the impacts of climate change. Every day we hear about Indigenous migrants who are forced to leave their home in search of work because it is no longer viable for them to make a living locally.

 

Countless Indigenous Peoples have been divided by imposed State borders, their communities and relatives separated by artificial lines, their migration patterns, sacred rituals, fishing and hunting ways altered. Innumerable Indigenous communities have suffered forced displacement due to conservation efforts, extractive industry operations, political strife, and the impacts of climate change. Every day we hear about Indigenous migrants who are forced to leave their home in search of work because it is no longer viable for them to make a living locally.

 

Countless Indigenous Peoples have been divided by imposed State borders, their communities and relatives separated by artificial lines, their migration patterns, sacred rituals, fishing and hunting ways altered. Innumerable Indigenous communities have suffered forced displacement due to conservation efforts, extractive industry operations, political strife, and the impacts of climate change. Every day we hear about Indigenous migrants who are forced to leave their home in search of work because it is no longer viable for them to make a living locally.

 

Countless Indigenous Peoples have been divided by imposed State borders, their communities and relatives separated by artificial lines, their migration patterns, sacred rituals, fishing and hunting ways altered. Innumerable Indigenous communities have suffered forced displacement due to conservation efforts, extractive industry operations, political strife, and the impacts of climate change. Every day we hear about Indigenous migrants who are forced to leave their home in search of work because it is no longer viable for them to make a living locally.

 

 

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