North Koreans Groaning Under Military Regime

It is a pity that North Korea has shown no sign of improvement in its notorious human rights conditions despite continued international efforts to condemn the Kim Jong-il regime's rampant rights violations and abuses. On Friday, the United Nations General Assembly approved a resolution against the North, calling on the world's last Stalinist country to stop trampling on the basic human rights of its people.

The nonbinding resolution, co-sponsored by 53 countries, is the fifth of its kind since the Assembly adopted the first one in 2005. It was supported by 99 of 192 U.N. member states, including the United States, Japan, Germany and South Korea. The Seoul government under the leadership of conservative President Lee Myung-bak began to co-sponsor the resolution last year, ending its silence on the rights situations in the North.

According to the resolution, systematic, widespread and grave violations are prevalent in North Korea. It is no surprise that the dictatorial authorities have continued to engage in arbitrary detentions, torture, extra-judicial killings and public executions of North Koreans. An estimated 150,000 to 200,000 political prisoners are incarcerated in concentration camps in the North.

The Kim regime has also been criticized for seeking forced repatriation of North Korean refugees staying in China. Upon returning home, most refugees are usually sent to labor camps where their rights are severely violated. Pyongyang should no longer refuse to pay heed to international calls to stop its shameful track record on human rights. It must recognize that such rights violations and abuses constitute crimes against humanity.

It is inconveniently true that countries around the world have put the North's rights issue on the backburner, sidelined by top priorities such as its nuclear program and development of long-range missiles and other weapons of mass destruction. South Korea has also long been refraining from raising its voice against the North in this matter out of fears that it might aggravate inter-Korean ties.

But now, the Lee administration is required to step up international cooperation to publicize the North's rights situations and prod the military regime to address the problem. It is almost impossible to expect a sudden change in the North's anachronistic ways of persecuting innocent citizens, dissenters and prisoners of conscience. More worrisome is that situations in the North could get worse, especially following the currency reform in which its old unit has been converted into a new one at the rate of 100 to one.

The South Korean government should work together with international organizations to closely monitor cases of human rights violations in the North, which could increase amid a famine and deteriorating economic and political situations in the already impoverished nation. The Kim regime is likely to further suppress basic rights and freedoms of North Koreans in a desperate attempt to tighten its grip on power and facilitate hereditary succession in the reclusive country.