The Network of the Indigenous Peoples – Solomons (NIPS)

C/o-PO Box 1751, Honiara

Solomon Islands
Contact email addresses: dmxplain@solomon.com.sb or grammie_vahia@hotmail.com

Taiwan Government Must Prevent

Violations of Free and Prior Informed Consent
Against Indigenous Peoples

Press Statement (for immediate release) May 26 2011

5.26 五月二六日 新聞稿
Taiwan Government Must Prevent
Violations of Free and Prior Informed Consent
Against Indigenous Peoples

From Network of Indigenous Peoples Solomon with support and endorsement of Taiwan Atayal
and Ping Pu Indigenous Peoples Organizations

* 由台灣友邦 索羅門群島原住民 發起
台灣泰雅族團體 及原住民權益團體 支持並共同簽署

* 強烈譴責 台灣政府未盡力保護原住民基因權被侵犯
並被流出國外 被研究學者申請專利 (高醫-葛應欽案 泰雅族痛風基因研究 並也有到友邦
索羅門群島 去採取 它們原住民血液樣本 DNA 因此索羅門群島原住民 也是受害者)

* 因為本週 又有台灣醫療團隊 抵達 友邦 索羅門群島 做醫療研究

* 又本週 在紐約 有聯合國原住民常設論壇的會議(UNPFII) 其有討論 規劃 保障 原住民的
權益 嚴禁盜用商用原住民 DNA 及其它的原住民生物 醫療 基因資料 原住民知識及原住民
之智慧財產權

* 因此 今日由索羅門群島原住民 發表新聞稿譴責台灣政府 已有台灣泰雅族團體 及平埔

原住民權益團體的支持並共同簽署

* 強烈要求台灣政府 盡其責任 實施保護原住民法規

禁止任何盜用 商用原住民基因之行為
並要求 台灣政府 遵守聯合國原住民權利宣言 及"Free, Prior and Informed Consent" (FPIC)
原則 (透過原住民族代表組織，取得其自由意志 與資訊完整下的事前同意)

Several organizations representing Atayal and Pingpu Aborigines in Taiwan and Indigenous
peoples in the Solomon Islands, call on the government of Taiwan to prevent violations of Free,
Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) against Indigenous peoples in Taiwan and elsewhere.

According to the United Nations Working Group on Indigenous Populations: “Free, prior
and informed consent recognizes Indigenous peoples’ inherent and prior rights to their lands and
resources and respects their legitimate authority to require that third parties enter into an equal
and respectful relationship with them, based on the principle of informed consent.” The principle
 Press Statement May 26 2011 Page 2 of 3

and right of Free Prior and Informed Consent (FPIC) is important in various articles of the UN
Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and is central to the ILO Convention No. 169
on Indigenous and Tribal Peoples of 1989. In Taiwan, the conflicts between biotechnology-based
development and the practice of FPIC are growing in intensity and scale. Taiwan state economic
policies are currently trying to integrate Taiwan’s Indigenous peoples into its biotechnology
development, seeking to repeat the successes in high technology based industrialization that
made it a major computer producer. Genetic research and health care are increasingly being
integrated into Taiwan’s industrial development efforts, with government policies encouraging
researchers to commercialize health research. The problems are critically illustrated in recent
cases involving the mass violation of FPIC committed by Ying-chin Ko, Taiwan's most
prominent researcher on Indigenous peoples’ health. Ko and a few colleagues filed several US
and Taiwan patent applications based on gout related genetic data from over 1500 Atayal
Aborigines and eventually nearly 200 Solomon Islanders. Major controversies resulted in the
researcher Ying-chin Ko withdrawing two US patent applications: 20090098056 in March 2010
and 20100248253 in April 2011.

Patents are particularly dangerous to self-determination because they are a commercial

property right that excludes other claims, including those of Indigenous peoples who participated
in the research. The US patent examination system only considers if an invention is novel, non-
obvious and useful, and does not care about FPIC, considering it a separate contractual issue
better suited to civil law. So when scientists file US patent applications without FPIC from
involved Indigenous peoples, they or their institutions are able to gain exclusive commercial
rights from the research. These patent applications effectively exclude involved Indigenous
peoples from decision-making processes, severely undermining Indigenous FPIC and self-
determination.

Taiwan Aboriginal activists have criticised genetic researchers’ abuses of FPIC since the
1990s, which involved many thousands of Aborigines. These abuses continue with the large
scale of these recent violations highlighting the serious dangers for Indigenous peoples posed by
biotechnology industrial development. Such development is based in large measure on the
transformation of nations’ populations into strategic resources, which imposes a particular
commercial reasoning on health care and genetic research. This reasoning leads to health
research ostensibly done for the benefit of Indigenous peoples being commercialized. Such
commercial pressures appear to contribute to serious conflicts of interest in oversight processes.
For example, the Taiwan National Health Research Institutes both approved and was the
assignee of US patent application 20090098056, which utilized genetic data from over 1500
Atayal Aborigines, even promoting this invention on its website.

Because genetic researchers operate in new areas of scientific knowledge for which laws
and regulations have often not been created, the tendency to interpret laws in ways favourable to
commercialization was evident in how Ko and his colleagues violated the principle and right of
FPIC. They only obtained informed consent from Atayal Aborigines and Solomon Islanders for
inclusion in health research projects. However, they then filed patent applications without
consulting involved Atayal Aborigines and Solomon Islanders and their communities.
 Press Statement May 26 2011 Page 3 of 3

A central premise of FPIC is that Indigenous peoples are engaged in a long term dialogue
with researchers marked by equality and reciprocity. However, in practice, commercial
considerations are consistently given more credence and deemed more important than
Indigenous rights and dignity. The scope of abuses in Taiwan indicates what amounts to
systemic racism within its scientific establishment, because powerful researchers can and do
routinely violate the rights and dignity of Indigenous peoples with impunity. Ko and his
colleagues’ mass violations have not been investigated, nor have they been professionally
censured. In light of the Taiwan scientific establishment’s current disrespect for Indigenous
peoples’ FPIC and self-determination, it is difficult to see how Taiwan scientific agencies can be
trusted to implement and properly respect any future agreements on Access and Benefit Sharing.

Like earlier forms of colonial exploitation, biocolonialism occurs when scientific

researchers and their institutions systematically reap benefits by violating Indigenous peoples’
self-determination, rights including FPIC, and dignity. While involved scientists have publicly
expressed the utmost paternalistic beneficence towards Indigenous peoples’ well-being,
including vague promises of future benefits for Indigenous peoples from such research, they
brazenly violated Indigenous peoples’ FPIC and self-determination in conducting research and
subsequent commercialization.

Therefore, we call on the Taiwan government to implement and rigorously enforce laws
and regulations to ensure that respect for FPIC at the individual and collective levels is central in
genetic research involving Indigenous peoples, both in Taiwan and abroad.

Co-signed by:

1. Network for Indigenous Peoples Solomons (Contact: Grammie Vahia e-mail:

grammie_vahia@hotmail.com)

2. Atayal Nation's Council of Taiwan (Contact: Mr. Urux Lbak phone 0910-297-012)

3. Atayal People Sustainable Development Association of Taoyuan County (Contact: Mr. Omi
Wilang, phone 0985-072-926

4. Atayal Presbyterian Church of Central Taiwan

(Contact: Rev. Yumin Hayung, phone 0920-619-793

5. Taiwan Association for Atayal People Sustainable Development

(Contact: Mr. Pagung Tomi, phone 0937-155-214)

6. Taiwan Indigenous Peoples Social Development Association

(Contact: Mr. Atong Yupas, phone 0921-608735)

7. Taiwan Association for Rights Advancement of Pingpu Plains Aborigine Peoples (Contact:
Jason Pan, E-mail: jasonpan@mail2000.com.tw ).