REPORT No. 98/09 1 PETITION 4355-02 ADMISSIBILITY XUCURU INDIGENOUS PEOPLE BRAZIL October 29, 2009 I. SUMMARY 1. On October 16, 2002, the Movimento Nacional de Direitos Humanos/Regional Nordeste [National Human Rights Movement/Northeast Region], the Gabinete de Assessoria Jurídica às Organizações Populares – GAJOP [Legal Advisory Office for Popular Organizations] and the Conselho Indigenista Missionário – CIMI [Missionary Indigenist Council] (hereinafter "the petitioners"), lodged a petition with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (“the Inter-American Commission” or “the IACHR”) against the Federative Republic of Brazil (“the State" or “Brazil”) for alleged violations of the rights to property, to a fair trial, and to judicial protection guaranteed, respectively, in Articles 21, 8, and 25 of the American Convention on Human Rights (“the American Convention"), in connection with the general obligations to respect the rights and adopt provisions in domestic law specified in Articles 1.1 and 2 of the same treaty, to the detriment of the Xucuru indigenous people and its members (“the alleged victims”), in the city of Pesqueira, state of Pernambuco. 2. The petition alleges the denial of the right to property of the Xucuru indigenous people because of the delay in demarcation of their ancestral land, as well as the lack of judicial protection to guarantee their right to property. According to the petitioners, the process of drawing of boundaries, marking, and titling of Xucuru indigenous land began in 1989 and is still not finished as of this date, due to actions filed by third parties with support of the State; the delay of the executive and judicial branches in resolving the administrative and judicial appeals they filed; changes in the rules and administrative procedures for demarcation in presidential decrees; and the ineffectiveness of the procedure for protecting the land rights of the indigenous peoples. The petitioners allege that as of this date the Xucuru indigenous people 1 Commissioner Paulo Sérgio Pinheiro, a Brazilian national, did not participate in the deliberation or decision of this petition, as provided in Article 17.2.a of the Commission’s Rules of Procedure. 1