U.N. General Assembly passes North Korean human rights resolution

[imText1]NEW YORK, Nov. 17 (Yonhap) — The U.N. General Assembly on Thursday adopted a European Union-sponsored resolution on North Korean human rights, expressing concern over the communist nation’s use of torture, prison camps and other types of inhumane treatment of its people.

Eighty-four members voted for and 22 voted against the resolution at the assembly’s Third Committee, in which all 191 U.N. member states have a seat. Sixty-two abstained, including South Korea.

This marks the first time that such a resolution has passed in the U.N. General Assembly, although similar resolutions have passed at the U.N. Commission on Human Rights every year since 2003.

South Korean Ambassador to the U.N. Choi Young-jin, addressing the assembly after the resolution’s passage, said his government’s efforts to improve North Korea’s human rights conditions must be sought in harmony with other priorities.

This is why Seoul abstained from the vote, he said.

North Korean Ambassador Kim Chang-guk, speaking before the vote, accused the United States and the EU of exploiting the human rights issue for political purposes.

The resolution is proof that the U.S. seeks to interfere in North Korea’s internal affairs and to overthrow the Pyongyang regime, he said.

Venezuela, Cuba, Malaysia, Belarus and Sudan were among the nations that sided with the North to oppose the resolution’s passage.

Kim left as soon as the resolution passed.

North Korea’s dire human rights conditions have been widely documented by defectors. Amnesty International has reported that the country is holding as many as 200,000 political prisoners in isolated camps, called “dictatorial areas.” A U.S. congressional report also suggests that more than 2 million North Koreans may have died of hunger and hunger-related diseases between 1995 and 1998.

The five-provision resolution, submitted by the EU on Nov. 2, registers the assembly’s serious concerns at reports of “widespread and grave violations of human rights” in the North, including torture, public execution and absence of due process and the rule of law.

Reports indicate Pyongyang’s regime severely restricts freedoms of thought and conscience, traffics women for the purpose of prostitution, and has yet to answer to unresolved questions relating to the abduction of foreigners, the resolution says.

The assembly lodged particular concerns with North Korea’s demand for the World Food Program to end its assistance by the end of this year and urged the nation to ensure that humanitarian organizations, in particular the WFP, “have full, free, safe and unimpeded access” to ensure continued humanitarian aid.

The EU has submitted similar resolutions at the U.N. Human Rights Commission every year since 2003. South Korea abstained from the vote in 2004 and in 2005 and was absent from the vote in 2003.

More than 6,500 North Koreans have defected to South Korea since the Korean War ended in 1953, including about 1,800 in 2004 alone. Most defected through China, which shares a long border with the North.

The two Koreas were divided in 1945 and are still technically at war after the 1950-53 Korean War ended with a truce, not a peace treaty.