Hope for North Korean Human Rights
(August 16, 2011)
Kim Moon-soo, Governor of Gyeonggi Province

On October 18, 2004, the US Senate unanimously passed the North Korea Human Rights bill. As a Korean statesman at the time, I was ashamed; I felt as if they were doing our job. So, on August 11th of 2005, I gathered a handful of members to collect the signatures of twenty eight National Assembly members and submitted the North Korean Human Rights Law Enactment to the Korean National Assembly.

-Residents of North Korea are also citizens of the Republic of Korea, and therefore the nation must protect their basic human rights according to the Korean Constitution.

-The government must be actively involved in resolving human rights issues between North and South Korea such as South Korean prisoners, those kidnapped by North Korea, separated families, and North Korean refugees.

-Form and maintain a North Korean Human Rights Record, North Korea human rights ambassador, and a facility that is wholly dedicated to solving issues relating to South Korean soldiers and the kidnapped.

These were the core items of my North Korean human rights proposal. But unfortunately this law was never even brought up in the Assembly. It soon expired and was discarded.

As North Korea suffered from widespread famine, a long line of defections continued since the mid 1990’s. North Korea’s human rights issue was the hot issue of the international world. With the lead of the EU, the UN has selected the North Korean Human Rights Resolution every year since 2005. Japan established a North Korean human rights law of their own, following the US, in 2006.

But for some reason, even while determining North Koreans to be citizens and welcoming North Korean defectors into Korea without questioning nationality and with a bundle of money for settlement, South Korea has turned away from any human rights issues. During President Roh’s time in 2003, the government withdrew from the UN’s human rights resolution vote. This continued in 2004 and 2005. The National Human Rights Commission of the Republic of Korea would fret over reviewing children’s diaries but, when they learned about North Korea’s brutal conduct against human rights by outsourcing the investigation, spending large sums of taxpayer money in the process, they then quietly slipped the findings under a rug. Back then, bringing a North Korean defector to testify one word or releasing a video of a North Korean public execution meant getting into a cockfight in the National Assembly, although all the while these things were freely available abroad. On September 2, 2004, twenty-five members of the Yeollin Uri Party (Our Open Party) sent a letter to the US embassy opposing the North Korean Human Rights Law in the US. When I brought up the North Korean Human Rights Law, they frowned and said, “We could be rubbing North Korea the wrong way. It can freeze our relationship with the North.”

How did the US Congress pass the North Korean Human Rights law unanimously when it has been sitting like a lame duck in Korea for six long years?

Sam Brownback, the current Governor of Kansas, proposed the “2003 North Korea Freedom Bill.” Soon, lawyer Doug Anderson, who worked for the East Asia and Pacific Affairs Subcommittee (Chairman Jim Leach) under the House of Representatives??? International Relations Committee (Chairman Representative Henry Hyde), laid the stepping-stones for the “2004 North Korea Human Rights Law.” Doug has long been interested in the issue. He has prepared Congressional hearings for North Korean defectors multiple times for Susan Sholte, a North Korean human rights activist.

The North Korean human rights bill was prepared and sent out to State Department personnel by Susan Sholte and Merriam Bell of the North Korea Freedom Coalition. NGO reporters from Washington and New York were also there to help. When the North Korean human rights bill was passed in 2004, Chairman Jim Rich thanked the North Korean Freedom Coalition for their exceptional efforts.

The US Congress passed the North Korean human rights bill by a voice vote all three times. Instead of each congressmen putting in a vote, they were asked if anyone apposed, and if there was no objections, the bill could be passed unanimously. The Republican Party made the proposal, but the Democrats had no reasons to object to it.

One-third of the world chose socialism, and over the past seventy years it has failed miserably, but no other country had to suffer from it as much as North Korea. The North Korean government is neglecting hundreds and thousands of children and allowing them to starve. Thousands are locked up in prison camps for political criminals. The throne is being handed down to a third generation. History has never seen such a malformed society. Over 20,000 North Koreans have escaped to the South. Their testimony draws a grim picture of North Korea’s human rights. The North Korean Human Rights Watch reported on the 21st of last month that the North Korean government is forcing families with young children to watch public executions. According to the results derived from interviewing 13,000 North Korean defectors, there are at least 182 detention facilities where those who are incarcerated have to survive on a single bowl of corn porridge or salted water. North Korea itself is a concentration camp.

Despite such desperate conditions, the Korean National Assembly is still undecided about passing the North Korean human rights law that the US Congress accepted seven years ago. Nothing is more empowering than the thought of someone praying for your wellbeing when you are trapped in a world of utter darkness. When we were suffering from long years of military dictatorship, outside interest in Korea’s democracy was like a ray of hope and served as inspiration for the freedom fighters. We must let light into the darkness that is North Korea. The North Korea human rights law will be a message of freedom and hope to its residents. When we are united, what will we tell the North Koreans when they ask us “What have you done for us?”

On the 20th of last month, twenty members of the United Kingdom’s House of Commoners and House of Lords sent a letter to four Korean party representatives encouraging passage of the North Korean human rights law. They are members of an APPG group that is concerned about North Korea. The letter states: “Improving the human rights of North Korea is in line with not only Korean but also the world’s interest.”

The Grand National Party has already announced that it will support a North Korean human rights law at a provisional session of the National Assembly in August. I hope this time the law will finally be passed. Hwang Woo-Yeo, a Grand National Party representative, is also the Chairman of IPCNKR and has been outspoken about North Korean human rights. So, this might be the year the law is finally passed.

http://www.hannara.or.kr/ohannara/anounce/hannara_view.jsp?no=10996&fno=2