page_title: Sámi people
section_title: Russia
hierarchical_section_title: Sámi people / Discrimination against the Sámi / Official Sámi policy / Russia
caption_attribution_description: Русский: Село Краснощелье
context_page_description: The Sámi people are an indigenous Finno-Ugric people inhabiting Sápmi, which today encompasses large northern parts of Norway, Sweden, Finland and the Kola Peninsula within the Murmansk Oblast of Russia. The Sámi have historically been known in English as Lapps or Laplanders. Sámi ancestral lands are not well-defined. Their traditional languages are the Sámi languages which are classified as a branch of the Uralic language family. The terms "Lapp" and "Lapland" are regarded as offensive by some Sámi people, who prefer the area's name in their own language, "Sápmi".
  Traditionally, the Sámi have pursued a variety of livelihoods, including coastal fishing, fur trapping, and sheep herding. Their best-known means of livelihood is semi-nomadic reindeer herding. Currently about 10% of the Sámi are connected to reindeer herding, providing them with meat, fur, and transportation. 2,800 Sámi people are actively involved in reindeer herding on a full-time basis in Norway. For traditional, environmental, cultural, and political reasons, reindeer herding is legally reserved for only Sámi people in some regions of the Nordic countries.
context_section_description: Russia has not adopted the ILO Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention, C169. During the Soviet times the inhabitants of the Kola tundra were forcibly relocated to kolkhoz'es (collective communities) by the state; most Saami were settled at Lujávri (Lovozero).
  The 1822 Statute of Administration of Non-Russians in Siberia asserted state ownership over all the land in Siberia and then "granted" possessory rights to the natives. Governance of indigenous groups, and especially collection of taxes from them, necessitated protection of indigenous peoples against exploitation by traders and settlers.
  The 1993 Constitution, Article 69 states, "The Russian Federation guarantees the rights of small indigenous peoples in accordance with the generally accepted principles and standards of international law and international treaties of the Russian Federation." For the first time in Russia, the rights of indigenous minorities were established in the 1993 Constitution.
  The Russian Federation ratified the 1966 U.N. Covenant on Civil and Political Rights; Section 2 explicitly forbids depriving a people of "its own means of subsistence." The Russian parliament (Duma) has adopted partial measures to implement it.
  The Russian Federation lists distinct indigenous peoples as having special rights and protections under the Constitution and federal laws and decrees. These rights are linked to the category known since Soviet times as the malochislennye narody ("small-numbered peoples"), a term that is often translated as "indigenous minorities", which include Arctic peoples such as the Sámi, Nenets, Evenki, and Chukchi.
  In April 1999, the Russian Duma passed a law that guarantees socio-economic and cultural development to all indigenous minorities, protecting traditional living places and acknowledging some form of limited ownership of territories that have traditionally been used for hunting, herding, fishing, and gathering activities. The law, however, does not anticipate the transfer of title in fee simply to indigenous minorities. The law does not recognize development rights, some proprietary rights including compensation for damage to the property, and limited exclusionary rights. It is not clear, however, whether protection of nature in the traditional places of inhabitation implies a right to exclude conflicting uses that are destructive to nature or whether they have the right to veto development.
  The Russian Federation's Land Code reinforces the rights of numerically small peoples ("indigenous minorities") to use places they inhabit and to continue traditional economic activities without being charged rent. Such lands cannot be allocated for unrelated activities (which might include oil, gas, and mineral development or tourism) without the consent of the indigenous peoples. Furthermore, indigenous minorities and ethnic groups are allowed to use environmentally protected lands and lands set aside as nature preserves to engage in their traditional modes of land use.
  Regional law, Code of the Murmansk Oblast, calls on the organs of state power of the oblast to facilitate the native peoples of the Kola North, specifically naming the Sámi, "in realization of their rights for preservation and development of their native language, national culture, traditions and customs." The third section of Article 21 states: "In historically established areas of habitation, Sámi enjoy the rights for traditional use of nature and [traditional] activities."
  Throughout the Russian North, indigenous and local people have difficulties with exercising control over resources upon which they and their ancestors have depended for centuries. The failure to protect indigenous ways, however, stems not from inadequacy of the written law, but rather from the failure to implement existing laws. Violations of the rights of indigenous peoples continue, and oil, gas, and mineral development and other activities, (mining, timber cutting, commercial fishing, and tourism) that bring foreign currency into the Russian economy.
  The life ways and economy of indigenous peoples of
caption: Krasnoshchelye village on the Ponoi River
exif: {"Image Make": "Canon", "Image Model": "Canon PowerShot S50", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "180", "Image YResolution": "180", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image DateTime": "2008:03:03 10:54:01", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ExifOffset": "196", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "180", "Thumbnail YResolution": "180", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "2036", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "5059", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/1000", "EXIF FNumber": "4", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2008:03:03 10:54:01", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2008:03:03 10:54:01", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "5", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "319/32", "EXIF ApertureValue": "4", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "107/32", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, auto mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "69/8", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2592", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1944", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "Interoperability RelatedImageWidth": "2592", "Interoperability RelatedImageLength": "1944", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "1556", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "2592000/283", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "486000/53", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "2", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard"}