TOKYO, 22 January 2016 (UN NewsService): The UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in North Korea Friday called on the international community to further all efforts to improve the human rights situation in the country.
“In addition to continuing political pressure to exhort North Korea to improve human rights, it is also now imperative to pursue criminal responsibility of the countrys leadership,” said Marzuki Darusman in Tokyo at the end of his last official visit as a UN Human Rights Council’s independent expert.
“Not much has changed in the country almost two years after the report of the Commission of Inquiry,” the Special Rapporteur, whose mandate ends in July 2016, added.
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According to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), since his appointment in 2010, Mr. Darusman has made several requests to visit North Korea; however, access was never granted. He has been visiting other countries in the region such as Japan, Thailand and South Korea.
“I regret to say that any act that can be construed as violence against the international community has negative implications on the human rights situation in North Korea,” the expert stressed, noting that his visit to Japan took place following the latest nuclear test by the North Korean Government.
“Such an act immediately overshadows the continuous efforts by the international community to improve the human rights situation in North Korea,” he stated, adding that it was all the more important for the international community to step up efforts to engage the isolated country in human rights dialogue while seeking to ensure accountability.
During his five-day mission, Mr. Darusman met with family members of victims of abduction and representatives of civil society organizations.
During his discussion with family members of victims of abduction and the Japanese Minister in charge of the Abduction Issue, the expert recalled that the former Supreme Leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-il, acknowledged that the country had been involved in abductions of Japanese citizens.
“Abduction, as a form of enforced disappearance, is a continuous crime, which does not end until the victim’s family learns of the whereabouts of their loved one and, where possible, the survivors are immediately returned to their families,” the expert noted.
“Resolving the abduction issue is a matter of urgency. The families of victims are advancing in age.”
“North Korea has an obligation to uphold and respect the Charter and international human rights law, exemplary of any full member of the United Nations,” Mr. Darusman concluded.
The Special Rapporteur will report his findings and recommendations to the UN Human Rights Council in March 2016.
Independent experts or special rapporteurs are appointed by the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council to examine and report back on a country situation or a specific human rights theme.
The positions are honorary and the experts are not UN staff, nor are they paid for their work.
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