“Issue of Abductees Must be Resolved at the South-North Summit”

[imText1]On the 18th, U.N. Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea Vitit Muntarbhorn visited S. Korea and in his address at a press conference argued that to solve the abductees issue, affirmative action should be made against the North Korean government such as approval of the Special Rapporteur’s entrance into N. Korea and action to end violations of human rights.

In preparation for the 2007 U.N. Human Rights Committee’s North Korea human rights report, Muntarbhorn came to S. Korea on the 14th visiting for 5 days.

Muntarbhorn said “While encouraging the South-North Korean governments to maximize the opportunities for separated families to reunify, from the position of supporting North Korean human rights, the South-North Korea summit must be continued” and advocated “North Korea has to effectively elucidate and resolve the pending issue of missing persons.”

He added “The South Korean government has made attempts to rectify issues related to separated families and missing persons after the Korean War, hence issues such as these should be resolved at the South-North Summit.”

He urged North Korea to allow the entrance of the U.N. Special Rapporteur and other human rights organizations into North Korea, so that they could adopt human rights measures in North Korea. He stated “North Korea needs to create a human rights summit, an economic development plan or legal program including human rights as a key topic to improve the situation of human rights within its own country.”

Furthermore, Muntarbhorn claimed that the S. Korean government needs to take affirmative action for defectors within S. Korea to assimilate in society.

“The S. Korean government should continue its humanitarian policies for defectors and provide greater opportunities for defectors to be educated and trained” and “Besides, encouragements need to be made for the contribution and investments of defectors in society” he said.

He added “In order to produce a report to reflect a defector’s position, visits to Hanawon (the settlement education center for North Korean defectors) were made as well as interviews with defectors” and claimed “Though the Korean government has an array of defector support programs, policies to aid defectors long-term need to be made.”

Regarding the six party talks taking up the issue of human rights, he said “The aim of the six party talks is to solve the nuclear issue and denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula” and “If mutual faith is built between the two nations, not only could the issue of security be naturally resolved but the issue of human rights also.”