[USFK Forums] GNP wants Seoul active in vote on human rights [JoongAng Daily]

[C. Y. Lee]

[Uploaded by C. Y. Lee, Tuesday, November 1, 2005]

GNP wants Seoul active in vote on human rights

November 01, 2005 ㅡ The Grand National Party said yesterday that it would submit to the National Assembly a resolution urging the administration to take a stand on a North Korean human rights resolution that a United Nations body will take up soon.

The conservative opposition group, unhappy with the administration’s policy of abstaining on past resolutions in the UN Human Rights Commission that condemned human rights abuses in the North, wants that changed early this month. The European Union plans to introduce early this month a resolution on the same subject, but this time to the UN General Assembly.

Seoul has abstained in the rights commission ballots for fear of adding an irritant to its relations with Pyongyang.A party official said yesterday it would be the equivalent of a crime for Seoul to remain silent about human rights conditions in the North. “Inter-Korean relations are important, but we can’t maintain those ties at the cost of human suffering,” the official said.

Despite its massive shipment of fertilizer and rice to North Korea in recent years, Seoul has been reluctant to ruffle any feathers north of the Demilitarized Zone. In August, the South Korean National Human Rights Commission was attacked by civic groups when the commission delayed its report on rights issues in North Korea out of concern of interfering with the six-party talks on the Stalinist state’s nuclear weapons.

Last weekend, Pyongyang warned that U.S. activism on rights put those nuclear talks in jeopardy. Separately, a Foreign Ministry official said yesterday that Vitit Muntarbhorn, the UN special rapporteur on human rights in North Korea, will visit Seoul on Wednesday.

by Brian Lee

[mike]

I think this quote sums up the current South Korean administration:

“Inter-Korean relations are important, but we can’t maintain those ties at the cost of human suffering”

The "Sunshine" Policy is terrible. You must always wave the stick when you are providing carrots.