The MAFUN (The Youth Association of Finno-Ugric Peoples) board member, coordinator of Mordovia MAFUN Basil Nemechkin at a meeting of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues proposed to discuss the possibility of introducing the post of ombudsman in Russia on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. This he told the world's leading media at a press conference in New York on May 18.

Basil Nemechkin voiced the main provisions of his report on the X session of the Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues. He said that in Russia it is necessary to discuss the possibility of introducing a Commissioner on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, by analogy with the mandate of the Ombudsman for the Rights of the Child. The presence of a special "ethnic" ombudsman will create new and effective mechanisms for the rights of indigenous peoples, including those with international experience and the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

*** The Youth Association of Finno-Ugric Peoples MAFUN is an international union of non-governmental youth organizations of Uralic (Finno-Ugric and Samoyed) peoples. By today the Association has 39 member organisations representing the Finno-Ugric youth from Hungary, Finland, Estonia and other countries. The Association's main objective is to preserve and develop Uralic cultures and languages, as well as disseminate information on them. The main task is to establish contacts and enhance cooperation of the Finno-Ugric youth through all kinds of youth's actions.