[Editorial] No Consideration for People in South and North Korea

The South Korean government abstained from a United Nations General Assembly resolution on North Korea’s human rights yesterday. The resolution, proposed by the European Union and Japan, expressed serious concerns for the widespread violation of human rights in North Korea ranging from torture and public execution, to the forceful repatriation of defectors back to North Korea. It urged that North Korea allow UN humanitarian aid agencies and NGOs to monitor humanitarian conditions in the country. South Korea shunned its responsibility as a liberal democracy and as a viable member of international society. We should have voted for the resolution.

Last year, the South Korean government approved a North Korean human rights resolution under pressure from at home and abroad. Behind the decision to abstain this year is President Roh. The president, while attending the ASEAN + 3 Summit in Singapore, reportedly ordered an abstention based on the justification that it is necessary to take into account “recent positive inter-Korean developments.”

Concerns surrounding the agreement produced in the inter-Korean summit this year, namely ‘no interference into internal affairs,’ finally took on real life meaning with the decision. The two Koreas consider universal values such as human rights as ones to which the principle of ‘no interference of internal affairs’ applies. The talk of ‘positive inter-Korean developments’ will not convince the nation and the world, however.

Was the inter-Korean summit intended to prepare a justification to be silent while 23 million North Koreans suffer? The Roh administration’s duplicity is unbearable given the administration has been using human rights as the justification for its policy to dig up and correct the nation’s history.

How can we talk about reconciliation of and cooperation between the two Koreas while we shun North Koreans and their miserable livelihoods? How can we reasonably explain that the country that produced the UN Secretary General abstained from voting for a UN human rights resolution? This case clearly reveals the true face of the Roh administration, which puts politics before the human rights of the people not only in the South, but also in the North.

The South Korean government’s response to the International Press Institute’s fourth letter to President Roh also shows the true nature of the current administration. In the letter the IPI urged that the government lift its ‘press gag order’ while warning that continued restrictions on the nation’s right to know could put South Korea onto the IPI Watch List after the presidential election. Nevertheless, what the Government Information Agency did in response was ignore the censure.

Nothing, including UN human rights resolutions and the IPI’s letters, seems able to change the Roh administration’s pro-North and anti-press mindset. In the minds of the administration, there is no place for the people in the South and the North alike. There is only their shop-worn and half-baked mindset. The nation should not allow another leftist administration full of self–righteousness and arrogance. There is no hope of reelection for the pan-ruling party circle and the Roh administration unless they disavow this mindset.