United Nations
Some of our people, especially Tracey Whare, Claire Charters, Andrew Erueti and Fleur Te Aho have participated in UN fora for decades:
- in negotiations on the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples;
- coordination for the 2014 World Conference on Indigenous Peoples;
- advocacy for the establishment of the UN Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples;
- making submissions, sometimes prepared with the assistance of students, to the UN Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues;
- in the UN General Assembly negotiations on greater participation for Indigenous Peoples at the UN;
- before the Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples;
- in advocacy before UN human rights treaty bodies such as the UN Human Rights Committee and the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination; and
- advising rōpū Māori on their claims to UN human rights bodies.
Our Māori students have contributed to te Wai Ariki’s submissions to the UN Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as part of their internships.
Of particular note, Claire and Tracey worked on a National Plan of Action to Realise the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples for more than a year as delegates of the National Iwi Chairs Forum. They both also work closely with the National Iwi Chairs Forum to annually prepare and present reports on Aotearoa New Zealand’s compliance with the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples to the UN Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.
Fleur, Anaru and Claire all completed their PhDs all on topics related to Indigenous peoples’ rights under international law and Tracey’s LLM thesis on a related topic was awarded the Law Schools’ top grade for a thesis in 2020.