Yahoo News 20 Apr 09;
WASHINGTON (AFP) – Indigenous peoples, who have been hard hit by the ravages of global warming, were gathering in Alaska Monday for talks on the impact of climate change on native communities.
"Indigenous peoples are on the front lines of this global problem, at a time when their cultures and livelihoods in traditional lands are already threatened," said Patricia Cochran, chairwoman of the Indigenous Peoples' Global Summit on Climate Change, one of the groups sponsoring the meeting.
"The indigenous community worldwide really wanted to have an opportunity to come together to discuss issues about climate change, and all the problems that they are facing in their communities and how we've tried to resolve those issues," she added.
Organizers said indigenous peoples from every region of the world will be represented at the meeting, sharing their observations and experiences of early impacts in their part of the planet, as well as traditional practices that could help ease the impact of climate change.
Cochran said the meeting plans not only to highlight the negative impact of global warming on native peoples, but to propose potential solutions "to address the climate impact being felt in our community."
The gathering in Anchorage is being held some 800 kilometers (500 miles) east of the Alaskan village of Newtok, where intensifying river flow and melting permafrost have forced 320 residents to relocate to higher ground.
The destruction of Newtok and nearby communities, as well as the relocation of inhabitants, has cost of tens of millions of dollars, native officials said.
Recommendations from the climate change meeting, which concludes on Friday with a declaration and an action plan, will be submitted to a United Nations climate change conference to be held in Copenhagen in December.
The indigenous groups, including representatives from Papua New Guinea, Borneo, Mexico, Kenya and Nepal among others, were to issue "recommendations for actions that we will take from here," Cochran said.
That included calls for greater representation by indigenous groups in drafting whatever international treaty ultimately succeeds the Kyoto accord on global warming.
The 190 countries which are party to the UN Convention on Climate Change are trying to negotiate a replacement to the Kyoto Protocol on reducing greenhouse gas emissions, which expires in 2012.
