Indigenous Australian people, their defence of the dead and native title

In July 2000, the indigenous peoples of Australia achieved significant progress in their struggle to regain ownership and determine the fate of ancestral remains preserved in western museums and medical schools.That month, a Select Committee of the British House of Commons recommended that the Department for Culture, Media and Sport

initiate discussions with appropriate representatives of museums, of claimant communities and of appropriate Governments to prepare a statement of principles and accompanying guidance relating to the care and safe-keeping of human remains and to the handling of requests for return of human remains.