A Native American at his home on Pine Ridge Reservation, South Dakota, which has some of the U.S.'s poorest living conditions.

In an investigation
monitoring ongoing discrimination against Native Americans, the United Nations
has requested that the U.S. government return some of the
stolen land back to Native Americans, as a necessary move towards combating
systemic racial discrimination.

James Anaya, the UN
special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples, "said that in nearly two
weeks of visiting Indian reservations, indigenous communities in Alaska and
Hawaii, and Native Americans now living in cities, he encountered people who
suffered a history of dispossession of their lands and resources, the breakdown
of their societies and 'numerous instances of outright brutality, all grounded
in racial discrimination,'" the Guardian reports. Common Dreams

HIGHLIGHTS

"The sense of loss, alienation and
indignity is pervasive throughout Indian country," Anaya said in a statement
released. Raw Story

"You can see they're in a somewhat
precarious situation in terms of their basic existence and the stability of
their communities given that precarious land tenure situation. It's not like
they have large fisheries as a resource base to sustain them. In basic economic
terms it's a very difficult situation. You have upwards of 70% unemployment on
the reservation and all kinds of social ills accompanying that. Very tough
conditions," Anaya stated. Common Dreams

"It is evident that there have still
not been adequate measures of reconciliation to overcome the persistent legacies
of the history of oppression, and that there is still much healing that needs to
be done." Raw Story

"Securing the rights of indigenous
peoples to their lands is of central importance to indigenous peoples'
socio-economic development, self-determination, and cultural integrity,' "Anaya
said. Raw Story

"I'm talking about restoring to
indigenous peoples what obviously they're entitled to and they have a legitimate
claim to in a way that is not divisive but restorative. That's the idea behind
reconciliation." IPS

Anaya has just
finished a 12-day research mission probing the current status and experience of
the U.S.'s roughly 5.2 million-strong
Native American population. IPS

The trip marked the
first time that the U.N. has waded into the contentious issue of
U.S. treatment of its
indigenous communities, one of the poorest and most marginalized populations in
the United
States.

FACTS & FIGURES

The United
States is home to some two million Native
Americans, who trail national averages in income and health.

The unemployment
rate for American Indians has typically been double that of the white
population. On reservations - self-governed tracts of land given to Native
American communities by the U.S. government - James Anaya, the UN
special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples, reported a 70 percent
unemployment rate.

Native Americans
have also long suffered from disproportionately low statistics in health and
education, as well.