SEOUL, Nov. 20 (UPI) — A U.N. committee adopted a resolution condemning North Korea’s human rights violations, Seoul’s Foreign Ministry said Thursday, with 61 co-sponsors including South Korea and the United States.
The draft resolution, introduced earlier this month to the Third Committee of the U.N. General Assembly, “condemns in the strongest terms the long-standing and ongoing systematic, widespread and gross violations of human rights in and by the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, including those that may amount to crimes against humanity.”
The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea is the official name of North Korea.
The resolution calls on Pyongyang to “respect, protect and fulfill all human rights and fundamental freedoms” and to “immediately close the political prison camps and release all political prisoners unconditionally.”
It was approved by consensus during a plenary meeting of the Third Committee on Wednesday.
South Korea was among the initial 41 member states to co-sponsor the resolution, despite speculation that the liberal administration of President Lee Jae Myung might withhold support in an effort to improve relations with Pyongyang.
However, South Korea maintained the position of former President Yoon Suk Yeol’s conservative government, with the Foreign Ministry noting that Seoul’s approach to North Korean human rights would remain a matter of principle.
In a statement on Thursday, the Foreign Ministry said the resolution “urges the DPRK to establish an operating environment conducive to the return of international and humanitarian staff and encourages all Member States and U.N. entities to provide more support for the work of civil society organizations.”
“The ROK government will continue its close cooperation with the international community for the substantive enhancement of human rights of DPRK people,” the ministry added, using the official acronym for South Korea.
North Korea has long rejected such resolutions as hostile acts, accusing the United Nations and Western powers of using human rights as a pretext to undermine its government.
During Wednesday’s plenary meeting, North Korean Ambassador to the United Nations Kim Song said Pyongyang “strongly condemns and totally rejects” the resolution, calling it “a document of political plots motivated by the impure intention of defaming the dignity of our republic and undermining its sovereign political system.”
Representatives of China and Russia also dissociated themselves from the consensus, with Beijing rejecting what it called a “politicized approach to human rights issues.”
A September report by the U.N. Human Rights Office found that North Korea’s human rights situation “has not improved over the past decade and, in many instances, has degraded,” citing worsening food shortages, widespread forced labor and tight restrictions on movement and expression.
This week, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un praised his regime’s state security forces, which run the political prison system and have been widely accused of employing brutal methods of repression and torture. The security apparatus has long been central to maintaining the Kim family’s grip on power through pervasive surveillance and the suppression of dissent.
The United States, which was not initially among the co-sponsoring nations, later joined the group that also includes Australia, Britain, France, Germany and Japan.
The resolution will be reviewed at the upcoming General Assembly plenary next month for final adoption.