On 10 May, a delegation of Amnesty International Nepal and Community Self-Reliance Centre (CSRC) met a team of WWF Nepal and presented the findings and recommendations made by their joint report entitled ‘Violation in the name of Conservation’.
On 9 August 2021, International Day of the World’s Indigenous Peoples, Amnesty International and Community Self-Reliance Centre had jointly launched the report,‘Violations in the name of conservation: What crime had I committed by putting my feet on the land that I own?’
In the meeting with the WWF Nepal team, Amnesty International Nepal Director Nirajan Thapaliya shared the findings and recommendations made in the research report that focused on the two largest national parks –Chitwan National Park and Bardiya National Park (BNP).
In the meeting, Director Thapaliya said:
The report shows that Nepal’s conservation success has come at a high cost for the Indigenous peoples living in the vicinity of the protected areas who have faced a litany of human rights violations such as arbitrary arrests, illegal detention, torture, unlawful killing and forced evictions amidst the State’s abysmal failure to provide effective remedies and reparations to the victims.
Arguing that social justice and environmental justice should go hand in hand, he urged the WWF Nepal, to ensure a human rights-based approach in its conservation efforts and advocate for the same in its engagements with the government and other stakeholders.
Likewise, Jagat Deuja, Director of CSRC requested the WWF Nepal to join hands in calling the government to amend the National Parks and Wildlife Conservation Act 2029 (1973).
In response, Dr. Ghana Shyam Gurung, Country Representative at WWF Nepal acknowledged the findings of the report and informed that they have taken the concerns raised in the report seriously. He also expressed the organization’s commitment to practicing a human rights-based approach to conservation efforts in Nepal.
Gurung informed the delegation that WWF Nepal has recently started its collaboration with National Human Rights Commission to develop a training manual targeted to the park officials and law enforcement agencies. He also reported of a recently organized training to the park officials and security personnel in human rights-based management of the park areas.