A/HRC/33/27 informed consent of indigenous peoples on decisions affecting them and their land, was also raised. The Committee included requests for information on indigenous peoples in the list of issues addressed to Bangladesh and Colombia. 59. The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women considered the reports of Bolivia (Plurinational State of), the Russian Federation, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Sweden. In its concluding observations, it highlighted the limited access that indigenous women have to health care, social services and the justice system. In respect of indigenous women, the Committee made recommendations on reducing the elevated rates of poverty, unemployment and gender-based violence, reducing the increased vulnerability to the effects of natural disasters, increasing awareness of rights and the means of ensuring their realization and increasing the participation of women in high-level decision-making positions and in public and political life. The Committee urged States parties to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women to address trafficking in indigenous women, ensure the rights of indigenous women in the context of harmful customary laws and practices and take measures to realize indigenous women’s rights to traditional lands, to a livelihood and to free, prior and informed consent. In addition, the Committee highlighted the need for disaggregated data on indigenous women and adopted general recommendations No. 33 (2015) on women’s access to justice, in which States parties’ obligations to indigenous women are highlighted, and No. 34 (2016) on the rights of rural women. 60. The Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination considered reports from Colombia, Costa Rica, the Netherlands, Niger, Norway and Suriname (eighty-seventh session); the Holy See and Mongolia (eighty-eighth session); and Rwanda and Spain (eighty-ninth session). The Committee expressed concern over the structural discrimination that many indigenous peoples face, the disproportionate rates of poverty and the barriers to access to culturally appropriate education and health care (especially for nomadic peoples), housing, employment, clean water, the justice system and legal remedy. The Committee recommended that States parties to the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination take steps to achieve legal recognition of indigenous lands and resources; free, prior and informed consent for any activities that may affect indigenous peoples; and indigenous peoples’ right to self-determination. The Committee raised concerns over violence against indigenous peoples, including indigenous women and human rights defenders, political representation, forced displacements, multiple forms of discrimination and the rights of indigenous peoples living in voluntary isolation and initial contact. Furthermore, the Committee urged a number of States parties to consider ratifying the International Labour Organization (ILO) Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention, 1989 (No. 169), and to collect disaggregated data. In addition, the Committee made recommendations to the Netherlands, Norway and Spain in relation to the activities of companies domiciled within their jurisdictions but operating abroad and the negative impacts of those business activities on local indigenous peoples. The Committee also sent a letter of concern to Papua New Guinea under the early warning and urgent action procedures in relation to the alienation of indigenous lands. 61. In May 2016, the OHCHR office in Guatemala provided technical assistance to indigenous women so that they could prepare a shadow report on follow-up to the recommendations of the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. The Committee, which had examined Guatemala in April 2015, requested, in its concluding observations, that the Government provide information on the implementation of three recommendations, including one on strengthening the national legal framework with respect to indigenous peoples and one on strengthening the political participation of indigenous peoples (see CERD/C/GTM/CO/14-15, para. 34). 12

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