IOSDE is under no illusion of the perfection of any group, institution or people/person. We hold that access to justice, and in the forms that are truly justice and healing for the victims themselves and from their own needs and perspectives, first and foremost, is paramount, as is system change coming from the knowledge, experiences and voices of victims themselves.

For persons in power, protecting, saving, authority or helping roles to take advantage of, use and/or abuse persons in vulnerable situations, and especially those whom they are meant to be helping or protecting, is the worst form of violation, as it cuts to the very core of the horror of dehumanization.

For any group to hide its own harms being committed by persons within its own ranks, and the socio-structural cultural norms therein that allow for such violations, is to enable the abuse and is a part of the cycle of violation. when an institution or group is more concerned with upholding its own image than facing its own flaws and accountability, corruption will always be present.

IOSDE strongly holds that the United Nations must be an institution of self-critique and internal process, yes, but also of accepted external critique and review, as any group or person of power, influence, authority or otherwise needs to be for true change and progress in the direction of actualized human rights.

The article The UN’s Shame: Sexual Exploitation and Abuse in UN Peacekeeping, by Kathleen Jennings, posted 21 Oct 2015, promotes an important discussion on these issues in the context of UN Peacekeepers and sexual and otherwise abuse of vulnerable persons and the UN's response therein. Ms. Jennings writes:

"...the UN’s response could be considered as much an attempt to protect the UN’s reputation as to protect vulnerable local residents. Thus far, it has done little to change the underlying problem – a potent mix of militarized, instable environments that provide peacekeepers with ample opportunity and, thanks to multiple, sometimes weak chains of command, little actual oversight; a rampant sense of impunity, helped along by the UN’s institutional deference to the rights of the accused over the rights of the accuser; racialized and gendered stereotypes of locals among peacekeepers, which are often reinforced by the in-mission training they received; and an entrenched ‘boys will be boys’ attitude among many within the UN system.

[...] As one of my own sources, a sex worker who (allegedly) suffered a violent assault at the hands of a MONUSCO (UN Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo) peacekeeper, told me when I asked her why she did not make a report: the UN only looks out for the UN." (IOSDE emphasis)

We hope you will consider all walks of life in which persons in vulnerable circumstances have been and are being taken advantage of, used and abused when needing help, equality or protection, and, socio-structurally, as well as culturally, in the context of group and/or institutional dynamic, why such re-victimization is able to happen.

IOSDE will continue to address these issues and suggests that the international human rights family and all persons do so as well.

It is with deep sadness that we face yet another killing of Lumad life (Mindanao, Philippines), this time of a leader of a Teduray chieftain in Maguindanao province on 2 October 2015. As reported, "Lencio Arig, a member of the Minted sa Inged, or council of leaders of the Timuay Justice and Governance, was shot dead in Sitio Keninan, Barangay Ramongaob, South Upi town by at least two gunmen as he walked home with his wife and young daughter," the leader known as someone who "always went out of his way to avoid conflict."

IOSDE strongly condemns all violence, intimidation, and other acts of human rights violations against Human Rights Defenders, and in particular those living and breathing the front lines for Indigenous Rights and especially in that context traditional healing, leadership, women's roles as revered and sacred, peaceful leadership, traditional territories, and self-determination including true sovereignty, separation from external powers and/or autonomy. Tragically, such violence against Human Rights Defenders is both historic and current with no respite; it is a norm for those defending Indigenous Rights and/or equality. Moreover, it is especially so for those defending rights that whilst confronting States, persons in power, business and authorities directly concerning laws, policies, and actions that are in deepest violation of the fundamental human rights, including true and actualized Indigenous self-determination, traditional leadership, traditional religion and sacred places and lifeways and territorial rights therein.

IOSDE has recognized from its inception that strategic killing of Indigenous Human Rights Defenders as well as their allies, and in particular or persons with deep meaning to their representative collectives for being true, faithful, kind-hearted and genuine in their positions and relations, is a strategic intimidation tactic on the part of the offenders or contractors. We also know that such intimidation tactics will never work as the offender/contractor intends; such tactics only strengthen the commitment of us all - globally, regionally and locally - to persevere all the more in support of the very rights and change those murdered, maimed and otherwise reduced and violated stood and stand for. In fact, IOSDE's very purpose is, in part, to collectively overturn the horrors created by those powers that be that meet human rights equality in action with violence. There are no reasons other than power and greed for violence to meet Human Rights Defenders. In fact, human rights, and Indigenous Rights therein, as well as Women's Rights and others rights, are to be engaged by brilliant minds, spirits and hearts of the world so to create safe and peaceful change for human rights progress.

It is with the attention and empathy of the international communities in the world that these actions will be reviewed and treated as the true genocidal acts that they are. When the citizens of the world come to realize that the very concept of citizenship that they may take for granted is actually a concept of statehood built on the backs of slaves, Indigenous Peoples, women, and desecration of the equality of all peoples and religions, the world will begin to mediate for a more peaceful state of life for all humans, as the collective that we truly are, without such horrors as the murder of Lencio Arig, the Lumads and Human Rights Defenders.

This statement can be found in pdf form for further distribution here:
IOSDE Statement on the Murder of Teduray chieftain 'meant to silence lumad struggle for rights', Mindanao, Philippines, 9 October 2015