ANTALYA, Turkey — Last year’s United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change gathering in Belém, Brazil, drew historic levels of Indigenous attendance, prompting observers and participants alike to dub it “the Indigenous COP.” Yet, beneath the milestone representation lay deep frustration and vocal protest. Many Indigenous leaders left the summit viewing it as little more than a continuation of a longstanding historical pattern of marginalization and exclusion from international climate negotiations.
Now, as world leaders and delegates gather in Antalya, Turkey, for COP31, the stakes have shifted. Billed as an “implementation” conference, this year’s summit is focused less on drafting sweeping new political pledges and more on the difficult procedural work of transforming previous agreements into concrete, binding action. For Indigenous advocates who traveled to Turkey, the conference—which kicked off on November 9—represents a critical test. It will determine whether the promises made in Brazil translate into tangible changes on the ground, including greater sovereign authority for Indigenous communities over global climate action.
“It is still a struggle,” said Edward Porokwa, a Maasai leader and member of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. “I’m yet to really determine whether there will be any more progress that is made in terms of realization of the rights of Indigenous people.”
Indigenous advocates at the summit are pressing national governments to follow through on a series of critical commitments. Among their primary demands is the legal recognition and strengthening of Indigenous land rights across 400 million acres in tropical forest countries. They are also calling on wealthy nations to disburse $1.8 billion in promised funding and to strictly respect the rights of local populations to free, prior, and informed consent during the rapid global transition to renewable energy.
Despite these formal pledges, vital funds have been slow to reach the communities that need them most. Meanwhile, Indigenous land defenders report that their rights and very lives remain under constant, escalating threat. Porokwa noted his ongoing concern that the disproportionate burden of addressing the global climate crisis continues to fall heavily upon smaller nations and Indigenous peoples, rather than the major historical polluters.
The real-world impacts of this inaction have been stark and devastating over the past year. In Nepal, catastrophic floods and massive landslides struck in August, killing more than 1,500 people and obliterating entire villages. In Canada, a historic wildfire season scorched millions of acres, forcing the emergency evacuation of thousands of residents from First Nations communities. Meanwhile, in Indonesia, toxic wildfire smoke alone has caused thousands of deaths and triggered widespread school closures and emergency public health measures across Southeast Asia.
“The recent large-scale mountainside collapse on the border of Nepal and Tibet should serve as a wake-up call to the global community,” said Biswash Chepang, a founder of the Institute for Indigenous Affairs and Development in Nepal.
These mounting climate-driven threats to Indigenous peoples and their traditional territories are unfolding against an increasingly precarious backdrop. A historically powerful El Niño is now threatening to drive widespread famine, extreme heat-related mortality, and other compounding catastrophes across multiple continents.
The conference also opens in the immediate wake of a sobering United Nations report warning that it is now virtually impossible to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, the foundational target established under the landmark 2015 Paris Agreement. For Indigenous delegates, this grim reality is a source of profound frustration. They view the failure to meet climate targets as the direct consequence of international decision-makers repeatedly ignoring traditional knowledge systems and dismissing the well-documented ways in which Indigenous environmental stewardship benefits ecosystems and cools the planet.
“For over thirty years we have brought Indigenous knowledges and sciences to these negotiations,” Māori activist Quack Pirihi said in a powerful opening statement delivered on behalf of the International Indigenous Peoples Forum on Climate Change. “Yet emissions continue to rise, putting 1.5 degrees Celsius beyond reach.”
While the urgent work of reducing global emissions and protecting Indigenous rights during the energy transition continues, securing financial assistance for nations and communities on the front lines of climate disasters remains a top priority. In October, the newly established Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage approved $21.6 million for Nepal. While historic as the fund’s first-ever disbursement, the amount represents less than 1 percent of the nearly $5 billion in infrastructure and economic damage the country sustained from recent climate disasters. Furthermore, the bureaucratic administrative processes required to actually receive and disburse those funds remain ongoing. Indigenous leaders emphasize that the fund must operate with significantly greater speed and efficiency, ratcheting up pressure on wealthy industrialized nations over unfulfilled climate finance commitments.
“Loss and damage is not simply a question of humanitarian assistance,” Chepang said. “It is also a question of climate responsibility, historical emissions, equity, and the right of affected communities to recover with dignity.”
In addition to demanding financial equity, Indigenous peoples are seeking new avenues to hold major corporate and state polluters legally accountable. Bianca Ranson, a Māori board member of the Aotearoa Climate Action Network, is attending COP31 in part to draw international attention to a landmark climate litigation case led by her father, Mike Smith, against major corporate emitters in New Zealand. The legal challenge, which seeks to apply Māori customary law to modern environmental harm, has faced significant resistance and been blocked by the national government.
Despite navigating severe logistical, financial, and political hurdles just to secure access to the negotiations, Ranson maintains that global spaces like the COP continue to hold vital strategic value.
“I think that with the geopolitical moment that we’re in, with the rise of the far right and fascism and war, and the struggles that Indigenous peoples are facing across the globe, it’s a really important place for us to be able to come together to connect, to strengthen our solidarity,” Ranson said.
As negotiations proceed through November 20, Indigenous advocates intend to maintain relentless pressure to ensure that high-level diplomatic discussions translate into measurable changes on the ground.
“Now I think it is not time only to talk about the commitment,” Porokwa said. “It is time to change the commitment into practice.”