Dear Relatives,
 

As April comes to a close, we are reminded of the cyclical rhythms that guide our lifeways and responsibilities as Indigenous Peoples. Across Turtle Island and beyond, the thawing ground, returning rains, and greening landscapes call us to tend our relationships—with the land, four-legged, two-legged and winged relatives, our ancestors, and future generations. This is a time of renewal and rebirth, as we emerge from a season of stillness, reflection, and dreaming, now moving into a season of action and transformation.


Following the celebration of our Mother Earth on Earth Day, we recognize that Indigenous stewardship is not a seasonal commitment—it is a continuous, generational responsibility. As climate chaos deepens and political repression grows, our connection to the land remains a source of strength, strategy, and spiritual grounding. This April, Earth Day resonated even more deeply as we confronted the rising threats of fascism, environmental destruction, and corporate colonization. Yet, like the Earth in spring, our movements continue to grow—rooted, resilient, and rising.


This spirit of renewal and resistance also carries into our work on the global stage. At the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues : [link removed] (UNPFII) this month, IEN joins Indigenous relatives worldwide in the collective push for true implementation of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP). This year’s theme—“Implementing the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples within United Nations Member States and the United Nations system, including identifying good practices and addressing challenges”—underscores how deeply true environmental, social, and economic justice is tied to Indigenous rights and sovereignty. Our advocacy is grounded in the truth that the health of the planet cannot be separated from the rights of Indigenous Peoples.


In this time of seasonal transition, our focus is clear: building Indigenous power to defend Mother Earth from extraction, exploitation, and contamination by strengthening, maintaining, and respecting Indigenous teachings and natural law. Whether at the UN or in our communities, we are asserting our inherent rights, advancing Indigenous-led solutions, and resisting false climate solutions along with the forces that threaten life itself. Our struggle is enduring, but so is our collective spirit. Let us move forward together—grounded in the land, our Original Instructions, guided by our ancestors, and committed to justice for all living beings.



IEN participates in the 24th Session of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues
 

The Indigenous Environmental Network (IEN) attended the 24th session of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII) at the UN Headquarters, New York City in the second half of April. Our thirteen-person delegation consisted of Indigenous Peoples and allies spanning Turtle Island to South America in Brazil, advancing global Indigenous priorities through direct advocacy and grassroots diplomacy. At UNPFII, our delegation hosted a series of five powerful side events amplifying Indigenous-led strategies to defend Mother Earth, assert rights-based frameworks, expose false climate solutions, and uplift Indigenous women’s leadership at the frontlines of intersecting environmental and colonial crises.
IEN Interventions and Key Advocacy PointsThe Indigenous Environmental Network delivered five official interventions to the UNPFII, raising global awareness of critical Indigenous issues. IEN’s presence at the UNPFII amplified a bold and urgent Indigenous agenda rooted in rights, responsibilities, and resistance. Our key interventions and advocacy points included:
Resisting Carbon Markets, False Climate Solutions, and Greenwashing: Great Grandmother Mary Lyons (Leech Lake Anishinaabe) warned of a new wave of colonialism : [link removed] hiding behind carbon markets, REDD+, and climate geoengineering—calling them false solutions that violate Indigenous rights and commodify Mother Earth. IEN called for a permanent moratorium on carbon markets, REDD+ and geoengineering technologies and practices, and demanded that Indigenous governance systems be respected in all climate frameworks​. Challenging the Financialization of Nature: Lyons further denounced the monetization of ecosystems under the green economy model, exposing the violence of speculative markets tied to conservation and development. IEN strongly rejected fossil fuel expansion and critical mineral extraction on Indigenous lands, and emphasized Indigenous jurisprudence as essential in global governance​.Exposing the Termination Agenda: IEN Sovereignty Advocate, Michael Lane (Menominee), warned of the reemergence of “termination policies” : [link removed] aimed at replacing and extinguishing inherent Indigenous rights in favor of state-defined authority. Lane critiqued processes that misuse UNDRIP to advance economic interests. IEN advocated for Inherent Relationships Jurisprudence—legal recognition of Indigenous knowledge systems that affirms inherent Indigenous sovereignty and self-determination as sustainable and ethical legal rights-based frameworks​.Environmental Health as a Human Rights Issue: Executive Director Tom BK Goldtooth (Diné/Dakota) voiced strong support for a future UNPFII : [link removed] theme centered on health, emphasizing the urgent need to address disproportionate toxic exposure in Indigenous communities—harms that fall especially hard on Indigenous women and children. Goldtooth highlighted unresolved legacies of industrial pollution, POPs, mining, plastics, and fossil fuels, linking toxic pollution and extractive industries to Indigenous health crises. He emphasized that environmental health is a matter of life and death for Indigenous Peoples and that health justice must integrate environmental protections and Indigenous sciences.Recognition and promotion of Indigenous feminisms: As colonial-patriarchal violence intensifies globally, we uplift the leadership, knowledge, and lived realities of Indigenous women, Two-Spirit, and gender-diverse peoples who are at the forefront of climate and social justice movements. Indigenous feminisms are foundational to community care, resistance, and regeneration.Centering Indigenous water ethics: Water is life, and our sacred relationships to water are guided by ancestral knowledge and responsibilities. We call for the recognition of Indigenous water governance systems and the protection of rivers, lakes, oceans, and all waters from extractive industries and commodification.Ground-level Indigenous organizing on the road to COP 30: IEN delegates from Brazil spotlighted the realities of environmental destruction, land struggles, and water crises in their territories. Their testimonies amplified regional organizing on the road to COP 30 and underscored the urgency of climate justice from the ground up. As we build toward the 2025 UN Climate Conference, we call for strong international solidarity with Indigenous-led movements rooted in sovereignty, traditional knowledge, and the defense of Mother Earth.IEN Side Events at UNPFII
 

IEN organized five powerful side events across New York City that uplifted Indigenous voices and deepened global dialogue on rights, resistance, and relational governance.
 

Our first panel took place on day 1 of week 1 of UNPFII, “Strategies and Experiences of Indigenous Women Navigating Climate Crises in a Changing Political Landscape,” co-hosted with Cultural Survival, highlighted how Indigenous women and Two-Spirit relatives are leading environmental, climate, and justice movements amid growing patriarchal and authoritarian violence. Our second panel, “Indigenous Rights of Mother Earth” included our friends from Movement Rights and brought forward Earth-centered legal and cultural frameworks rooted in natural law and explored the global movement to recognize the rights of nature. For our third event, “Indigenous Rights & Rights of Mother Earth: Strengthening Earth Law Movements,” co-hosted with Earth Law Center, panelists shared insights on ecocentric legal initiatives and Indigenous governance—from the Rights of Manoomin and rivers to ocean protections—framing law through inherent relationships and responsibilities. 
 

In week 2 of UNPFII, IEN hosted a dialogue on “Water, Air, Earth & Biodiversity: Emerging Markets in the Financialization of Nature Paradigm” where we examined how colonial economic systems are commodifying nature and creating financial derivatives from ecosystems, accelerating the exploitation of Mother Earth. Finally, we concluded our line-up of events with “UNDRIP: Best Practices Defending Indigenous Peoples Against Climate False Solutions” where we explored how the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples continues to serve as a critical legal and political tool for resisting REDD+, carbon offsets, and other extractive climate schemes that threaten Indigenous territories under the guise of conservation.
 

Moreover, as part of our international solidarity efforts at UNPFII, IEN deepened strategic alliances with Indigenous partners from Brazil, Colombia, and Chile, strengthening collective resistance on the road to UNFCCC COP30 in Belém, Brazil, taking place in November 2025. Delegates from Brazil raised urgent concerns about land defense, deforestation, climate-driven flooding and drought, and emphasized the importance of Indigenous leadership in shaping global climate action. These gatherings fostered cross-regional collaboration, aligning movements across the Americas in defense of land, life, and Indigenous sovereignty.


To learn more about our work at the 24th session of UNPFII, read more on our website : [link removed]!



Keep It In The Ground
 

This April, the KIITG team gathered in person on the ancestral lands of the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde in Oregon for a powerful in-person strategic planning retreat. Grounded by a cultural prayer and historical overview offered by the Chachalu Tribal Museum and Cultural Center, the gathering brought together KIITG team members and allies—including virtual participation from IEN organizers across Turtle Island and beyond. Together, they mapped out scopes of work, next steps, and analyzed the broader political landscape to guide IEN’s KIITG strategy for the next three years. During the convening, Thomas Joseph Tsewenaldin (Hupa, Karuk, Paiute-Shoshone) shared an oral history of IEN’s carbon market education materials and led a Q&A on our Ring of Fire initiative—fostering critical internal cross-pollination on false solutions education and Indigenous resistance to carbon markets.
 

Also this month, IEN Mining Organizer Talia Boyd (Diné) joined Water Walkerz, a grassroots group based in Seneca Nation territory, for their annual Nuclear Free Water Walk on April 19, 2025. Held at 10 AM, the healing walk served as a ceremony in motion—every step a prayer for the waters, land, people, and all creation impacted by radioactive contamination from the West Valley Nuclear Waste Facility. The walk raised critical awareness of the full nuclear chain—from mining to waste—that continues to poison bodies and the ancestral Seneca territory. Radionuclides are hot and harmful to life, and contaminated discharges from the West Valley site persistently flow into Buttermilk Creek, Cattaraugus Creek, and Lake Erie—waters sacred to the Seneca Nation and all who live downstream and downwind. The walk stood as both a spiritual offering and a powerful call for justice, healing, and accountability.
 

Back on the West Coast in Los Angeles, Divestment Organizer Marcello Federico (Blackfoot/Cherokee) attended the Mobility Unbound Network convening (April 13–16), a collaborative initiative led by Equivolve and PolicyLink. The convening centers community self-determination and envisions liberated mobility and just transition pathways for historically marginalized communities. It is a bold step in advancing intersectional policy priorities at both local and national levels, reinforcing KIITG’s commitment to climate justice that includes economic and transportation equity.
 

Indigenous Just Transition
 

In late April, IJT Coordinator Loren White, Jr. participated in the Mandan Hidatsa and Arikira  Nation’s Traditional Food and Seed Festival, hosted by Nueta Hidatsa Sahnish (NHS) College. As part of IEN’s food sovereignty work, Loren led a hands-on traditional gardening demonstration at the Four Sisters Garden, helping to strengthen local knowledge, seed traditions, and Indigenous food systems in the heart of his home community.



Gitigaan (IEN Teaching Garden)
 

Back at IEN’s Headquarters in Bemidji, MN, Greenskeeper and Administrative Associate Kaylee Carnahan reports….
 

We’re thrilled to introduce the newest member of our IEN Teaching Garden : [link removed] team — please join us in giving a warm welcome to Liseli Polvika, Red Lake Anishinaabe enrollee, our new Garden Assistant!
 

Liseli brings a vibrant mix of creativity, innovation, and a strong work ethic to our garden. Whether she's dreaming up new ways to make our space more beautiful and functional or rolling up her sleeves to tackle the toughest tasks, her dedication is already blooming. More than anything, she’s passionate about building community — and we know her energy and ideas will help our garden grow in all the best ways.
 

This will be an exciting season for the Teaching Garden with many new hands involved and we are continuing to grow our roots out through the community, helping to heal lands and waters, and build resilient ecosystems in our communities. Seedlings are growing strong for our community giveaway event in May and our Seed Library (image below) is a hot destination for getting local and regional seeds.
 


 

Fossil-fuel free growers tip: anyone who works with Black ash (Fraxinus nigra) for basketry, use the scraps for plant tags, they work great, don’t smudge and don’t turn into micro plastics in your garden

Click or tap here to learn more and apply : [link removed].



Fight over Oak Flat continues ...The fate of Arizona’s proposed Resolution Copper mine rested with the federal courts until the administration announced it would move to approve the project before their rulings... Click here to learn more : [link removed] Says He Won't Recognize Indigenous Peoples Day Alongside Columbus DayNative advocates including Crystal Echo Hawk (Pawnee), founder of the Native advocacy organization IllumiNative, said in a previous statement about Columbus Day debates that continuing to celebrate Columbus "glorifies colonialism and ignores the genocide of Native peoples." Click here to learn more : [link removed].
Education Department Moves to Defend A Historically Inaccurate Native American Mascot“The U.S. Department of Education will not stand by as the state of New York attempts to rewrite history and deny the town of Massapequa the right to celebrate its heritage in its schools,” Education Secretary Linda McMahon said in a statement on Friday. Click here to learn more : [link removed].



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IEN Staff & Management



The Indigenous Environmental Network - PO Box 485 - Bemidji - MN - 56619

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