Ms. Andrea Carmen
Executive Director, International Indian Treaty Council (IITC)
Ms. Andrea Carmen, Yaqui Nation, began her work with the International Indian Treaty Council (IITC) as a student intern in 1976, has been a staff member since 1983 and became its Executive Director in 1992. Andrea was IITC’s team leader for work on the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and has many years’ experience as a human rights trainer and observer around the world. In 1997 she was one of two Indigenous representatives invited to formally address the UN General Assembly for the first time in history at the UN Earth Summit +5. She has served on a number of boards and advisory councils. In 2010, she was one of two members from North America on the Global Steering Committee for the International Indigenous Peoples Forum on Climate Change (IIPFCC) which coordinates indigenous peoples’ work with the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. In February 2019 Andrea was selected by indigenous peoples, tribes and organizations in North America to serve as their representative on the new Facilitative Working Group for the development of the UNFCCC Local Communities and Indigenous Peoples’ Traditional Knowledge Exchange Platform for its first three years of operation.