A/HRC/38/23 I. Introduction 1. As mandated by the Human Rights Council in its resolution 18/8, the Council held its annual half-day panel discussion on the rights of indigenous peoples on 20 September 2017. The theme of the discussion, pursuant to Council resolution 33/13, was the commemoration of the tenth anniversary of the adoption of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, with a special focus on challenges and good practices in achieving the ends of the Declaration. The present report is submitted pursuant to resolution 33/13. 2. The panel discussion was aimed at: identifying good practices and challenges in achieving the ends of the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples; examining the role of indigenous youth in the promotion and protection of the rights of indigenous peoples; and considering the way forward in implementing the Declaration including through collaboration between relevant human rights mechanisms. 3. The panel was chaired by the President of the Human Rights Council, and moderated by Albert K. Barume, Chair-Rapporteur of the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. The panellists were Dalí Ángel, coordinator of the Red de Jóvenes Indígenas de América Latina (Indigenous Youth Network of Latin America), and Karla General, an attorney at the Indian Law Resource Centre. The third panellist, Christine Kandie, a programme officer at the Endorois Welfare Council, was unable to participate due to travel delays. The original moderator for the panel, Grand Chief Wilton Littlechild of the Confederacy of Treaty Six First Nations, also faced travel delays but was able to provide concluding remarks. 4. The panel was accessible for persons with disabilities and was webcast and recorded.1 II. Opening of the panel discussion 5. The President of the Human Rights Council opened the panel discussion. 6. The Deputy High Commissioner said that Cayuga Chief Deskaheh of the Iroquois Nation had come to Geneva in 1923 seeking to address the League of Nations and that his great granddaughter, Karla General, was among the panellists currently present. The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples was recognized as a global standard: however, many challenges remained in its implementation. It was important to focus on future generations. International human rights mechanisms could play a significant role in that regard: for example, the Convention on the Rights of the Child had been the first of the core international human rights treaties to include specific references to indigenous peoples. 7. There were links between the trauma of forced assimilation and many of the challenges that indigenous youth currently faced, such as infant and maternal mortality, alcohol and substance abuse, and persistently low access to education, employment and health care. In order to address that situation, indigenous children and youth must be engaged, empowered and enabled. They must become partners of equal dignity when it came to implementing their rights under the Declaration. It was important to collect and analyse appropriate data in order to ensure that policies affecting indigenous peoples’ lives were based on sound evidence. The data gap must not remain a stumbling block for the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals. 8. Decisive rights-based action was needed, recommendations had been issued and indigenous voices heard, and the path that must be followed was that of implementation for and with indigenous peoples, including indigenous children and youth. 1 2 See http://webtv.un.org/search/panel-discussion-on-rights-of-indigenous-peoples-19th-meeting-36thregular-session-human-rights-council/5581732710001/?term=&lan=english&cat=Human%20Rights%20Council&sort=date&page=36.