From 21 April to 2 May 2025, the UN Headquarters in New York hosted the 24^th session of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII) which endorsed the report of the International Expert Group Meeting, held virtually in December 2024, titled ‘The rights of Indigenous Peoples, including those in voluntary isolation and initial contact in the context of critical minerals’(E/C.19/2025/4), incorporating, under agenda item 4, its recommendations into the Forum’s official conclusions. The UNPFII’s conclusions prioritise the right to self-determination as fundamental to protecting Indigenous Peoples in voluntary isolation (IPVI) and Indigenous Peoples in initial contact (IPIC); however, more readily enforceable rights, such as the right to life, often prove more effective for immediate legal protection.

Definition and Challenges Faced by Indigenous Peoples in Voluntary Isolation and Initial Contact

Although the legal status of IPVI and IPIC is not formally defined in international law, the terms are widely understood based on definitions developed by the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (EMRIP) (A/HRC/EMRIP/2009/6 para.7), the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights (IACHR) (OEA/Ser.L/V/II. Doc.47/13 para. A-B) and national legislation mostly produced by South American countries of the Amazonian region.

In the aforementioned report (E/C.19/2025/4 para. 26a-b), IPVI are identified as Indigenous Peoples, or segments thereof, who have never maintained, or no longer maintain, regular contact with the majority population, and who deliberately avoid interaction with outsiders. The same document (para. 11) characterises IPIC as those who have only recently engaged with the majority population, or who, despite prolonged contact, remain unfamiliar with the prevailing norms, institutional structures, and patterns of interaction within the dominant societal framework.

Both groups are generally located in areas that are particularly difficult to access and rich in natural resources, which exposes their territories to heightened risks of external encroachment, exploitative land use, particularly extractive operations. Moreover, illegal mining and deforestation have disastrous effects on their physical survival, exposing them to introduced diseases to which they may have no immunological memory.

UNPFII Recommendations and the Principle of ‘No-contact’ as a Legal Ground for the Right to Self-determination 

At its 24^th session, the Forum recognises that, unlike other Indigenous Peoples groups, the paramount expression of self-determination for IPVI and IPIC is their decision to remain isolated, which is safeguarded by the principle of ‘no contact’.

Given the symbiotic relationship that IPVI and IPIC entertain with their territories and the significant threats posed by the accelerating demand for critical minerals, the recommendations place particular emphasis on ensuring the ‘intangibility and irreducibility’ of their lands and waters (E/C.19/2025/4 para. 33). Member States and governments, in alignment with art.26 and 29 of the UNDRIP, are, thus, called upon to legally designate territories inhabited by IPVI and IPIC as permanent ‘no-go zones’ for extractive activities and safeguard ‘biocultural territorial corridors’ to ensure IPVI and IPIC free mobility, territorial and cultural integrity (para. 33-36).

The UNPFII’s conclusions affirm that the right to self-determination must be understood as the primary ground for protecting IPVI and IPIC, and as the principal framework for interpreting their related rights. However, as argued by Sital Kalantry and Nicholas Koeppen, relying primarily on the right to self-determination poses two main problems in terms of implementation. Firstly, although enshrined with binding force in Article 1 of both the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), the right to self-determination is not listed among the non-derogable rights in Article 4 of the ICCPR, and may therefore be deprioritised when exceptional circumstances arise. Secondly, being traditionally attributed to independent statehood in international law, its application to Indigenous groups has long raised and continues to raise sovereignty concerns due to its territorial implications. Consequently, States may be more reluctant to enforce it.

Moreover, in the case of IPVI and IPIC, the right to self-determination demands a contextual interpretation, which in practice often translates into safeguarding their very survival against external interference. Hence, anchoring protective measures in more immediately actionable rights, such as the non-derogable right to life, which imposes positive obligations on States to act, renders legal implementation more immediate.

[The acronyms IPVI and IPIC refer to Indigenous Peoples in voluntary isolation and initial contact, respectively, and are used solely for reasons of conciseness, without intent to diminish the visibility, identity, or dignity of these groups as recognised in full under international standards and in accordance with their self-identification.]