North Korea warns against UN human rights office in South Korea

North Korea warned of “strong” action against a UN office which will be set up in South Korea to monitor human rights violations in the communist country.

The North’s Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of Korea slammed South Korea for accepting a request from the Geneva-based Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to open a field office in Seoul, which a spokesman labeled “an anti-DPRK (North Korea) plot-breeding organization aimed at launching aggression and bringing down the social system” in the North.

Seoul decided in late May to allow the establishment of the UN office, a move welcomed by rights bodies as a public manifestation of international concern over the state of human rights in North Korea. In a resolution following a report by UN investigators, the council in March condemned “systematic, widespread and gross human rights violations” in the North.

The UN Human Rights Council in Geneva has expressed hope that the new office will improve the efficiency of investigations into human rights violations in the North, and could even reduce their frequency and intensity.

[AFP]

This entry was posted in DPRK Government, Humanitarian Aid and Relief, North Korean refugee, Prison Camps by Grant Montgomery.